The forced nature of the decisions is also evident from descriptive survey data about the time available to prepare for migration and the ability to capitalize assets. Figure 3 presents the share of refugees in Kurdistan and Jordan<sup>9</sup> who took one day or less, between one and seven days, and more than seven days to prepare for moving. The vast majority (more than 75 percent) of refugees in Kurdistan and Jordan had a week or less to prepare, with half the Syrian refugees in KRI and 36 percent of Syrian refugees in the Jordan sample having at most a day to prepare. In addition, a natural consequence of forced displacement is the decapitalization of the fleeing population through the loss of assets. The SRHCS allows us to describe this process by comparing immovable asset ownership prior to displacement with the status of these assets upon displacement (Figure 4). Focusing on the two types of assets with higher ownership rates in 2010, dwellings and vehicles, more than 60 percent of the Syrian refugee households owned a dwelling in 2010, irrespective of their country of asylum in 2015, and more than one-third report that it was destroyed at the time of displacement. Similarly, for vehicles (cars, trucks, and motorcycles), which were owned by roughly one-fifth of refugees (results not shown). Among owners of dwellings, only a tiny fraction—ranging from less than 1 percent in Lebanon to almost 4 percent in Kurdistan—was able to sell their dwelling in preparation to leave. For vehicles, the corresponding number ranges from roughly 15 percent in Jordan to almost 50 percent for Syrian refugees in Kurdistan.

# **_B. First and Subsequent Destinations_**

To estimate the degree of decision-making power of Syrians under forced migration, we examine the distance to their first destination of refuge. Theoretically, events and circumstances outside of people’s control largely determine where they end up under forced migration. We model how far refugees traveled by exploring the relationship between total driving time from refugees’ home districts to the districts where they initially settled in host countries, relating this to household characteristics, origin district, and timing of displacement.

On average, refugees reported the following travel times to reach their destinations: 7.5 hours to Kurdistan, 4 hours to Lebanon, and 2 hours to Jordan (constant estimate in columns Jordan, Lebanon, and KRI in Table 2). The distance traveled to the first destination is determined mostly by factors outside refugees’ control: location of origin, timing of displacement, and the direct effect of the conflict on household assets and the ability to capitalize them. In Lebanon and Kurdistan, for example, refugees who left Syria in 2014 traveled significantly farther than Syrians who left in 2012. On the other hand, in Jordan, refugees traveled significantly shorter distances in years other than 2012. It is likely that host-country settlement policies arbitrarily affect the distance traveled by Syrian refugees. If all Syrians crossing into Jordan were assigned to camps after 2013, that would explain the year-specific impact of distance traveled. Home destruction is negatively related to distance traveled. But, households that were able to sell assets traveled longer distances. Likewise, refugees in Jordan and Kurdistan who had no time to prepare traveled a shorter distance. In Kurdistan, economic opportunities at the destination as measured by expected monthly income is statistically significant, but the magnitude of the influence on distance traveled is small. All in all, the evidence on the first origin is consistent with the decisions being largely determined by external

> 9 The question was not included in the survey in Lebanon.

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