Archive | 2021
POLICY INDUCED MIGRATION IN THE UNITED STATES
Abstract
State and local adoption/repeal of highly polarized policies causes migration responses\nboth out of and into the affected region. Interpreting the responses as revealed policy pref?erences leads to the conclusion that marijuana legalization and abortion waiting periods\nhad been favored nationally, while gay marriage had been opposed. Policy preferences are\ngeographically heterogeneous, which leads to different responses across counties. From 1992-\n2017, these policy changes reduced domestic migration by two percent, which is approxi?mately 20% of the total migration decline. The migration changes, via partisan sorting,\naccounted for a significant share of the increased political polarization from 2012-2016 in\nwestern, urban, and swing counties. In cases where unmarried parents have joint physical custody of their child(ren), there\nis a wide range of default relocation restrictions that depend on their state of origin. Using\nIRS county-to-county migration data, demographic data from the ACS, and state relocation\nrestrictions gathered from divorce law websites, I study the impact of these default reloca?tion restrictions on domestic US migration. Results from both regression discontinuity and\nselection on observables designs, find about 10% - 30% less migration to counties that are\noutside the allowed relocation range. This migration friction is shown to strengthen from\n1992 - 2012, as both joint physical custody and unmarried parents became more common,\nthereby contributing to the decline in domestic US migration. In the United States, between 2004 and 2008, 28 states increased their minimum wage;\nthe national minimum wage was increased in 2007. The average migration response to these\nincreases was a 3% change in migration away from a one dollar increase. These effects are not\ndistributed evenly across the population. People from more impacted demographic groups\nare more likely to move away from minimum wage increases.