This general trend has hit most of the Swedish municipalities or local labour markets in form
of net out-migration. In 1990, 62 out of 284 municipalities showed net out-migration - the
corresponding figure for 1999 were 189. As elderly people have low migration intensities the
result will be an accentuated lop-sided age structure. This is a well-known experience for
many Swedish municipalities and local labour markets but it has now been even more
accentuated according to the low birth rates all through the country.
Connection between net-migration 1990 (X-axis) and 1999 (Y-axis)
Figure 1. Connection between net-migration 1990 (X-axis) and 1999 (Y-axis) with regard to
284 Swedish municipalities.
CREATING LOCAL LABOUR MARKETS
The municipality level is not the best division when migratory movements with relevance to
labour market conditions. Instead 109 functional local labour markets (LLMs) have been
created. The point of departure in the creation of LLMs is the 284 municipalities that existed
in the beginning of the 90s. This means also that changes in the number of municipalities have
been standardised according to the municipality structure and the commuting conditions of
1988 - the year when the first division in LLMs were done (Carlsson et.al., 1993).