IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/pubcho/v61y1989i2p171-176.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Welfare policies and migration of the poor in the United States: An empirical note

Author

Listed:
  • Richard Cebula
  • James Koch

Abstract

This paper has investigated the impact of geographic welfare benefit differentials upon migration in the United States. Unlike other related studies, which typically focus upon black migration (as a surrogate measure of migration of the poor), the present study focuses directly upon migration of the poor per se. A variety of reduced-form estimates are provided. The evidence strongly suggests that the net in-migration of the poor is positively and significantly influenced by higher nominal AFDC levels and by higher real AFDC levels. These findings support the ‘welfare magnet hypothesis,’ which alleges that relatively high welfare levels act to attract poor migrants. Moreover, given that poor migrants are attracted non only by high nominal welfare levels but also by high real welfare levels, an argument can be made for establishing geographically uniform real welfare benefit levels in the United States. This uniformity presumably should act, over the long run, to eliminate the human resource distortions being caused by the currently prevailing welfare system. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1989

Suggested Citation

  • Richard Cebula & James Koch, 1989. "Welfare policies and migration of the poor in the United States: An empirical note," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 61(2), pages 171-176, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:61:y:1989:i:2:p:171-176
    DOI: 10.1007/BF00115663
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/BF00115663
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/BF00115663?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lowell E. Gallaway & Richard J. Cebula, 1973. "Differentials and Indeterminacy in Wage Rate Analysis: An Empirical Note," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 26(3), pages 991-995, April.
    2. Richard J. Cebula, 1978. "An Empirical Note on the Tiebout-Tullock Hypothesis," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 92(4), pages 705-711.
    3. Greenwood, Michael J, 1975. "Research on Internal Migration in the United States: A Survey," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 13(2), pages 397-433, June.
    4. Richard Cebula, 1977. "Nonwhite migration, welfare, and politics—A reply," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 32(1), pages 155-156, December.
    5. Greenwood, Michael J, 1969. "An Analysis of the Determinants of Geographic Labor Mobility in the United States," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 51(2), pages 189-194, May.
    6. Rishi Kumar, 1977. "More on nonwhite migration, welfare levels, and the political process," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 32(1), pages 151-154, December.
    7. Cebula, Richard, 1978. "The Determinants of Human Migration," MPRA Paper 58401, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Brian Cushing, 2005. "The Role of Welfare and Space in the Migration of the Poor," Working Papers Working Paper 2005-08, Regional Research Institute, West Virginia University.
    2. Brian J. Cushing, 1993. "The Effect of the Social Welfare System on Metropolitan Migration in the US, by Income Group, Gender and Family Structure," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 30(2), pages 325-337, March.
    3. Lars P. Feld, 2000. "Fiskalischer Wettbewerb und Einkommensumverteilung," Perspektiven der Wirtschaftspolitik, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 1(2), pages 181-198, May.
    4. repec:rri:wpaper:200508 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Keith Dowding & Peter John & Stephen Biggs, 1994. "Tiebout : A Survey of the Empirical Literature," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 31(4-5), pages 767-797, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Richard J. Cebula, 2009. "Migration and the Tiebout‐Tullock Hypothesis Revisited," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(2), pages 541-551, April.
    2. Cebula, Richard J. & Alexander, Gigi M., 2006. "Determinants of Net Interstate Migration, 2000-2004," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 36(2), pages 1-8.
    3. Richard Cebula & K. Avery, 1983. "The Tiebout hypothesis in the United States: An analysis of black consumer-voters, 1970–75," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 41(2), pages 307-310, January.
    4. Cebula, Richard, 1978. "The Determinants of Human Migration," MPRA Paper 58401, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Foley, Maggie & Angjellari-Dajci, Fiorentina, 2015. "Net Migration Determinants," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 45(1).
    6. Richard Cebula, 2005. "Internal Migration Determinants: Recent Evidence," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 11(3), pages 267-274, August.
    7. Alexander, Gigi & Foley, Maggie, 2014. "Determinants of Migration, Revisited," MPRA Paper 56967, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Hubert Jayet, 1996. "L'analyse économique des migrations, une synthèse critique," Revue Économique, Programme National Persée, vol. 47(2), pages 193-226.
    9. Gershon Alperovich & Joel Bergsman & Christian Ehemann, 1977. "An Econometric Model of Migration Between US Metropolitan Areas," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 14(2), pages 135-145, June.
    10. Richard Cebula, 1974. "Local government policies and migration," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 85-93, September.
    11. Leonard Carlson & Richard Cebula, 1981. "Voting with one's feet: A brief note on the case of public welfare and the American Indian," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 321-325, January.
    12. Spilimbergo, Antonio & Ubeda, Luis, 2004. "Family attachment and the decision to move by race," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(3), pages 478-497, May.
    13. Onder, Ali Sina & Schlunk, Herwig, 2015. "State Taxes, Tax Exemptions, and Elderly Migration," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 45(1).
    14. Cameron, Gavin & Muellbauer, John & Murphy, Anthony, 2006. "Housing Market Dynamics and Regional Migration in Britain," CEPR Discussion Papers 5832, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    15. Cebula, Richard, 1973. "Local Government Policies and Migration: An Analysis for SMSAs in the United States, 1965-1970," MPRA Paper 50068, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 02 Feb 1974.
    16. Chi, Guangqing & Voss, Paul, 2005. "Migration Decision-making: A Hierarchical Regression Approach," Journal of Regional Analysis and Policy, Mid-Continent Regional Science Association, vol. 35(2), pages 1-12.
    17. Ira Saltz, 1998. "State income tax policy and geographic labour force mobility in the United States," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(10), pages 599-601.
    18. Joseph Gerard Hughes & Brendan M. Walsh, 1980. "Internal migration flows in Ireland and their determinants," Open Access publications 10197/1512, School of Economics, University College Dublin.
    19. Craig E. Landry & Okmyung Bin & Paul Hindsley & John C. Whitehead & Kenneth Wilson, 2007. "Going Home: Evacuation‐Migration Decisions of Hurricane Katrina Survivors," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 74(2), pages 326-343, October.
    20. Cebula, Richard, 1984. "Living Costs, The Quality of Life, and the "Sunbelt" vs "Frostbelt" Battle in the United states," MPRA Paper 52055, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:61:y:1989:i:2:p:171-176. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.