Ebbs and Flows in Recent U.S. Interstate Migration∗

Abstract

Interstate migration exchanges in the United States are temporally and spatially transitory. Both the early and mid‐1980s exhibited significant fluctuations in the origins and destinations of U.S. migrants, while the late 1980s and early 1990s were even more unstable. Regions once favored by interstate movers such as the West and the South, while remaining attractive, showed evidence of declining favor in the early 1990s. Meanwhile, numerous states in the national interior regained their attractiveness, including several that gained net migrants for the first time in decades. California exhibited a major turnaround in its migration, perturbing the entire U.S. migration system.

The Influence of Booms and Busts in the U.S. Economy on the Interstate Migration System

“…As much as states in the Northeast and Midwest industrial core have shown negative efficiency rates (as found in Group 1) over this time period, NY seems to set itself apart in terms of the significant and consistent movement of people out of the state. Manson and Groop (1996) found a similar pattern in the 1980s as well. One other interesting aspect of Group 1 is the inclusion of CA and HI, generally considered to be states with high‐quality environmental amenities.…”

“…Moving on to a more geographic analysis of population redistribution in the U.S. over this time period, the migration efficiency data used above were broken down to the state level and analyzed in a few different ways. First, it would be useful to determine if there are some broad trends that groups of states followed throughout this time period with respect to their migration efficiency rates (Manson and Groop 1996). Using a K‐means cluster procedure on all the annual efficiency rates for the states, six distinct groupings emerged for the time period 1988–1989 to 2005–2006.…”

“…One other interesting aspect of Group 1 is the inclusion of CA and HI, generally considered to be states with high‐quality environmental amenities. However, shocks to the CA economy have caused a reversal in its decades‐long growth trend, especially since the early 1990s (Manson and Groop; Miller 1995), and HI has a migration pattern all its own, probably due to its remote location and the high cost of living.…”

“…For example, a well‐investigated change in migration took place in the 1980s because of the ups and downs of the energy industry, especially in resource‐driven states like Texas (McHugh and Gober 1992). Alternatively, others investigated the changing nature of migrant flows in and out of California during the 1990s as the state net migration rates turned negative (and the state economy declined), making the state a very efficient redistributor of population (Manson and Groop 1996).…”

“…At the system (national) level, these researchers and others have shown how gross migration streams have abruptly changed over time as the system moved from a relatively static state with inefficient migration streams (and low migration efficiency rates) to a dynamic state with relatively high migration efficiency rates (Manson and Groop 1996; McHugh and Gober 1992; Miller 1995; Plane 1994). This migration research has also attempted to link variations in the migration system to changes in the national economy, although there is still disagreement on the magnitude and direction of this relationship (McHugh and Gober; Miller).…”