Who Stays in Their Birthplace? The Role of Intergenerational Ties, Family Characteristics, and the Geographic Context

Jonne Thomassen , University of Groningen
Emma Lundholm, Umeå University
Gunnar Malmberg, Umeå University

A growing body of literature shows that the propensity to migrate is lower when family lives close. Moreover, as the duration of stay increases, one is more likely to continue staying in place because strong local ties are accumulated over time. Using Swedish population register data, we aim to identify who stays in the place of birth and uncover some of the determinants for this staying behaviour. Our descriptive findings show that around 40% of the 30-year-old Swedes have continuously stayed in their birthplace by that age despite the high propensity of migrating during young adulthood. Among the stayers, we find more individuals who are born and raised in the place of birth of at least one of their parents and one of their grandparents than among the movers. In the final version of the paper, we show the results of a logistic regression (1 = stayer by age 30; 0 = mover by age 30) to investigate the role of such intergenerational birthplace-ties on staying behaviour in the birthplace as well as the role of other family characteristics at age 18 and the geographic context of the birthplace.

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 Presented in Session 110. Life Course: Linked Lives