While research has consistently demonstrated a positive relationship between migration from rural areas and educational attainment, it is unclear whether migration is the driver of educational attainment or merely a mediator. The "rural brain drain" perspective suggests that young people leave rural areas if they have greater academic potential than their peers. A "migration gain" perspective implies that people, regardless of prior achievements, may move to invest in human capital, thereby gaining more education than those who do not move. This article uses data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 97 to test these competing predictions with multilevel/mixed-effects models. Consistent with previous research, the study found that youth attained the least education if they stayed in non-metro areas. By contrast, they gained more education if they moved not just from but also to non-metro areas, consistent with the "migration gain" hypothesis. Academic performance alone did not explain the association between education and migration, contradicting the "rural brain drain" theory. However, academic performance and college enrollment, which are also influenced by available educational opportunities, together explain the association between migration and education significantly, suggesting that the educational outcomes of migrants are influenced by a combination of individual and institutional characteristics.

Previous scholars have demonstrated that nonmetro residents who move to metro areas earn higher wages. It remains an open question whether this metro wage advantage persists in the contemporary era, and how migrating influences young adults from metro areas. Migrants may earn higher wages due to higher education. Alternatively, they may earn lower wages because they lack social capital. They may experience different associations of migration and wages when growing up in nonmetro versus metro areas due to different family backgrounds, education, and community contexts. This article uses data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 97 and multilevel/mixed‐effects models to test these competing predictions. The findings show that young adults earned higher wages if they worked in metro rather than in nonmetro areas, regardless of migration, confirming a metro wage advantage. People who left nonmetro areas earned higher wages than if they stayed, consistent with a “rural brain drain.” In addition, people earned similar wages if they stayed in, returned, and moved from metro to nonmetro areas, even though migrants and returnees had higher average education. The non‐significant wage differences may be due to the less diverse wage structure in nonmetro labor markets and in‐migrants' lack of social capital.