Migration and employment status during the turbulent nineties in Sweden

Paper to be presented at the 41th
ERSA Congress in Zagreb, August
29 - September 1, 2001. Draft

MIGRATION AND EMPLOYMENT STATUS DURING

THE TURBULENT 90s IN SWEDEN

Mats Johansson

Swedish Institute for Growth Policy Studies (ITPS)
Ostersund, Sweden
e-mail:[email protected]

Abstract. The 1990s was a turbulent decade in the Swedish economy with the deepest crisis
since the great depression of the 30s. It seems also to differ a lot from earlier decades with
respect to migration patterns - a post-industrial one has substituted the industrial migration
pattern. The segmentation of the labour market has been accentuated and a welfare state
equilibrium with an increased mismatch on the labour market as one ingredient. One
consequence of this transformation process is that the connection to the labour market
situation has diminished as an explaining factor with respect to migratory movements. Only
one tenth of the job recruitment on a local labour market is external and this is valid for in-
migrating as well as out-migrating areas.

This paper analyses the migration between 109 local labour markets in Sweden during the
turbulent 1990s. In this paper a lot of regressions are done with respect to the movers’
employment status before and after migration. Four years - 1991, 1993, 1996 and 1997 - are
analysed including differing categories as employed, unemployed, students and people outside
these groups. Net-migration between local labour markets is also investigated for employed
and students and the same ‘explaining’ variables are used. From these cross-section analyses it
seems obvious that the motives are different for various categories and that they also differ
with respect to the economic situation.

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