Some Socio-Economic Factors in Internal Migration

N THE study of internal migration little is known about the dynamics of migration. We have a few established generalizations regarding the characteristics of migrants, but there is disagreement among the findings of many studies. It seems reasonable to assume that many of these disagreements could be reconciled if we knew more about the reasons for migration, what sorts of people move as a result of various sorts of socioeconomic changes, what types of people move into and out of various types of areas, and what combinations of social characteristics occur in streams of migrants. Because of the large number of variables involved, studies which would throw light on the dynamics of migration are much more difficult to plan and carry out than studies on just numbers of migrants. It is difficult to study the reasons for migration because a person usually has several reasons for any particular move, some of the reasons probably being unrecognized or subconscious. Stouffer's Theory of Intervening Opportunities' requires that migrants be divided into groups according to their reasons for moving before a rigorous test of the theory is possible. Thus until we know more about reasons for migration, Stouffer's theory can be neither proved nor disproved. The Bureau of the Census has made what is probably the only nationwide study of reasons for migration. This study is reported in Current Population Reports, Series P-20, No. 4, October 7, 1947, under the title "Postwar Migration and Its Causes in the United States: August, 1945, to October, 1946." The percentage distribution by reasons for migration is shown in Table 1. The first two categories, to take a job and to look for work, indicate the importance of the economic factor. It is also interesting to note that 52 percent of the migrants might be called involuntary migrants inasmuch as they were merely members of families, the heads of which were moving. The bulletin from which Table 1 is taken furnishes additional information on education and age of migrants and type of last civilian move. More studies of this sort are needed and it is hoped that the Census will ask such questions in its sample studies at relatively frequent intervals in the future. However, more intensive studies are also needed to analyze in greater detail the reasons for migration. With the migration data for 1935-40 we do not have the reasons for migration. However, it is possible to examine this data within a framework of reasons for migration. In general, people move in order to improve their circumstances, the most important special reason being to improve economic circumstances. Other things can be improved by migration also-social status, housing conditions, health, family situation, etc. However, assuming that a person moves in order to improve his economic status, we still are left with the questions of why he moved to this particular place at this particular time when someone else made a different move in order to improve economic status. Present migration data will not yield specific answers to these questions, but they can be made to give information on the characteristics of people who make particular sorts of moves. From these we can possibly infer some reasons that eventually might be tested in a field study. One of the most obvious approaches to the study of characteristics of migrants responding to various socio-economic changes and moving in and out of various sorts of areas is to compute correlation coefficients between characteristics of migrants and socio-economic conditions and changes. Tables 2-6 present 238 such correlation coefficients computed using states as the varying units. The variables selected are largely the result of an exploratory approach and are not planned to test any selected hypotheses. Such an approach is fruitful in yielding clues for more intensive investigation. * Paper read at the Conference on Migration Research, Chapel Hill, N. C., November 2-4, 1950. t For computing assistance the author is grateful to John K. Folger, Research Fellow, and to James J. Maslowski, Research Assistant, of the Institute for Research in Social Science, University of North Carolina. 1 Samuel A. Stouffer, "Intervening Opportunities: A Theory Relating Mobility and Distance," American Sociological Review, V (December 1940), 845-867.