Migration and the Spatial Concentration of Poverty¹

Abstract

Current Population Survey data are used to estimate the effects of migration of the poor and nonpoor on the spatial concentration of poverty among five categories of counties defined by county poverty rates and, separately, among nonmetropolitan high‐poverty areas, central city high‐poverty areas, and other areas. During the 1981–1984 period studied, migration patterns of both the poor and nonpoor consistently reinforced pre‐existing poverty concentrations. High migration rates of the poor into and out of high poverty counties suggests an equilibrium condition. Implications for theory, research, and policy are discussed.

The Impact of Migration on Poverty Concentrations in the United States, 1995-2000

“…To isolate the impact of poor and nonpoor migration streams on the poverty rate for each county category, we employ a disaggregation technique utilized by Nord et al. (1995).…”

“…However, a compelling body of migration research challenges many of the assumptions of both neoclassical and human capital theoretical perspectives. Nord et al. (1995), for example, examined annual migration levels and patterns for the poor and nonpoor across counties grouped by poverty status between 1982 and 1984.…”

“…In this article, we investigate the extent to which migration patterns functioned to concentrate or deconcentrate poverty in the late 1990s, an era notable for its economic expansion and overall decrease in poverty. In doing this, we explicitly build on the analytical and methodological framework utilized by Nord et al. (1995) and Nord (1998).…”

“…Few analyses of the decline, however, have looked at the role of migration in reducing or increasing poverty concentrations amid these trends. The role of migration in redistributing poverty is especially important in nonmetropolitan areas because of the significant demographic role migration has played in creating poverty concentrations in these places (Lichter, Heaton, and Fuguitt 1979; Lichter and Johnson 2007; Lichter, McLaughlin, and Cornwell 1995; Nord 1998; Nord, Luloff, and Jensen 1995). This article examines the domestic migration patterns of the poor and nonpoor between 1995 and 2000, employing 1995 to 2000 county‐to‐county migration data from the 2000 decennial census to examine how migration flows affect poverty concentration.…”

Rural Poverty and its Consequences in Structurally Weak Rural Areas of Austria from the Mayors’ Perspective

“…Despite the availability of substantial information about the behavioral, cultural, economic, and political characteristics of high-poverty areas, spatial mobility of the poor has been a rather neglected topic until the mid-1990s. Nord, Luloff and Jensen (1995) state that there was little information about migration patterns of poor and non-poor and especially about in-migration and out-migration of the poor in and between poverty-ridden areas. In their analysis of the census data from 1982 and 1984, they found that the spatial concentration of poverty was not directly linked to the unwillingness or lack of resources of poor people to move out; quite astonishingly, there was a high out-migration rate of the poor but an even higher in-migration rate as well leading to a high turnover within the poor population.…”