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The role of the housing market in the migration response to employment shocks

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  • Jeffrey Zabel

Abstract

The United States is known for the ability of its residents to move to where the jobs are, and this has helped the nation maintain its position as the world?s top economy. Households? decisions to move depend not only on job prospects but also on the relative cost of housing. I investigate how the housing market affects the flow of workers across cities. This occurs through at least two channels: the relative mobility of homeowners versus renters, and the relative cost of housing across markets. I use homeownership rates to measure the former, and use an index that measures house prices across metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs); the price elasticity of housing supply; and the growth rate of house prices to capture the latter. ; To show how variation in these factors affects cross-city migration, I estimate a VAR model of migration, employment, wages, house prices, and new housing supply using data from 277 U.S. MSAs for 1990?2006. The impulse response functions based on employment supply and demand shocks show substantial variation when evaluated at different values of the homeownership rate, the price elasticity of housing supply, relative housing prices, and their growth rates. I also allow for spillover effects in the model that reflect the impact of a labor demand shock in the nearest city.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeffrey Zabel, 2009. "The role of the housing market in the migration response to employment shocks," New England Public Policy Center Working Paper 09-2, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedbcw:09-2
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    Cited by:

    1. Ritashree Chakrabarti & Junfu Zhang, 2010. "Unaffordable housing and local employment growth," New England Public Policy Center Working Paper 10-3, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    2. Nikolay Kurichev & Ekaterina Kuricheva, 2020. "Interregional migration, the housing market, and a spatial shift in the metro area: Interrelationships in the case study of Moscow," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(4), pages 689-703, August.
    3. Caliendo, Marco & Gielen, Anne C. & Mahlstedt, Robert, 2015. "Home-ownership, unemployed’s job search behavior and post-unemployment outcomes," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 218-221.
    4. Samuel M. Otterstrom, 2015. "Income Migration and Home Price Trajectories in the United States," International Real Estate Review, Global Social Science Institute, vol. 18(2), pages 277-302.
    5. N. K. Kurichev & E. K. Kuricheva, 2018. "Regional Differentiation of Buyers’ Activity in the Primary Housing Market of the Moscow Agglomeration," Regional Research of Russia, Springer, vol. 8(4), pages 322-333, October.
    6. N. K. Kurichev & E. K Kuricheva, 2019. "Migration and Investment Activity of Residents of Russian Cities in the Housing Market of Moscow Agglomeration," Regional Research of Russia, Springer, vol. 9(3), pages 213-224, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Migration; Internal - United States; Housing - Prices; Labor mobility;
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