# **Effects on Migration**

In order to test the hypothesis that violence did not affect education decisions but affected the location of students, we carry out the following analyses that show that violence affected the residence of individuals.

The models estimated are similar to the ones shown above, but have as dependent variable the number of individuals in the population group living in the municipality. Table 6 shows the coefficients of homicide rates (and drug-related homicide rate) on the logarithm of the total number of people resident in the municipality. Each row shows the result of a separate regression where the dependent variable refers to a different population group (the first row shows the coefficient when the dependent variable is total population, the second and third show the regressions when the dependent variables are total male and total female population; from the fourth onwards show the results by age group). The first two columns show the 2000 to 2010 results (the first one is the barebones Differences-in-Difference approach, whereas the second one adds time-varying public expenditure controls). The last four columns restrict to the 2005 and 2010 data points, and alternate the “homicide rate” and “drug-related homicide rate” variables.

The regressions for total population show a strongly significant impact on total population. On average, a municipality suffering an increase in its homicide rate of 8.3 per 100,000 inhabitants would experience a reduction of 0.17% in its population according to the 2000-2010 specifications (columns 1 and 2). Columns 3 and 4 show the results for the 2005-2010 specifications and though the magnitude is somewhat smaller, they are not statistically different to those on columns 1 and 2. The corresponding results using the variable “drug-related homicide rate”, however, do show a substantially smaller impact. This may be a result of a higher measurement error in that variable, which would bias the coefficients towards zero. In any case, all specifications are consistent with there being outmigration for increasingly more violent municipalities and towards relatively safer ones. This result is consistent with Rios (2013), who estimates that a total of 264,693 individuals have migrated fearing organized crime activities in Mexico between 2005 and 2010. In addition, that study presents anecdotal evidence whereby a significant number of these migrants migrated from more violent municipalities to cities with lower levels of violence.

Rows two and three show nearly identical effects for the male and female populations, a result that is perhaps not surprising if families are moving entirely. All population groups show a statistically significant effect of the expected direction. Interestingly, however, upper secondary-age children (as well as college age youth) seem more likely to be relocated than basic-school aged children as a response to spikes in homicide rates. In the first column, the coefficient for 15-17 year olds, equals - 0.0022, about twice as high as the coefficient for 6-14 year olds (-0.0011). Although there are slight variations in those coefficients across the specifications (different columns in the table), in all cases the coefficient for 15-17 year olds is at least double that of 6-14 year olds.

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