The COVID‐19 pandemic has affected economies, labor markets, health care, education and tourism around the globe in unprecedented ways. However, little research has yet been devoted to the impact that the pandemic might have had on internal migration. This study aims to address this gap by determining how the intensity and spatial patterns of internal migration changed between 2019 and 2020 in Germany. We draw on data from the population register on annual flows between 401 counties. We find that the COVID‐19 pandemic was associated with a 5% drop in the intensity of inter‐county migration in 2020 compared to the previous year, with significant variation across age. The pandemic was also associated with an upsurge in net migration losses for the largest cities, driven by fewer inflows of young adults and continuing outflows of families.
In 1885 and 1889 Ravenstein published two seminal papers on the role of migration in changing population distribution. This article analyses the importance of internal migration for shaping the spatial population distribution of Germany in the last three decades. We use a time-series dataset of annual inter-county migration flows from the German population register for the years 1991 to 2017. Population density is used as proxy measure for settlement type as an alternative to the commonly used BBSR typology. Our findings show that around 3 percent of the population moves between counties each year, and that the efficacy of internal migration in redistributing population has declined since the 1990s. Our results are in line with other recent work stating that the re-urbanisation phase, which was prevalent during the 2000s, has ended and sub-urbanisation patterns have become more prominent since 2011. We show that internal migration indeed plays an important role in shaping the distribution of population, especially the movements of young adults and families along the rural-urban continuum. In the 1990s and 2000s, internal migration tended to be more important for shaping regional populations than international migration and natural population change. Notably, this ranking reversed in the last few years and natural population change even became positive for densely settled regions.
* This article belongs to a special issue on “Internal Migration as a Driver of Regional Population Change in Europe: Updating Ravenstein”.
BACKGROUND After losing a population of more than 1.2 million through migration to the West, in 2017 East Germany recorded net internal migration gains for the very first time since reunification. OBJECTIVE In consideration of this trend reversal, we investigate internal migration patterns between East and West Germany since reunification and discuss their consequences for population dynamics. METHODS We use annual inter-county migration flows for the period 1991 to 2018 to calculate the yearly total number of registered moves and internal migration rates differentiated by citizenship, age, and sex. RESULTS East Germany currently experiences small net population gains through internal migration among almost all age groups and noticeable net population losses only among labor market entrants (25-29 year olds). In addition, the results show that men have dominated West-East migration throughout the entire study period and East-West migration since about 2008. CONCLUSIONS Internal migration between East and West Germany has changed significantly since reunification. The continuing population losses among labor market entrants reveal that the West German labor market is still more attractive for young adults. The sex
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