Income dynamics in rural areas: what influence of residential migrations?[Dynamiques de revenu dans les espaces ruraux : quelle influence des migrations résidentielles ?]

Although incomes have significantly evolved in France over the last 30 years, rural municipalities remain poorer than the other types of municipalities. However, this general overview hides a great heterogeneity within rural areas. In order to shed light on how residential migration influences these changes, we, first, characterise French municipalities according to their income dynamics between 2000 and 2011. Second, we compare the different profiles of municipalities according to their degree of urbanisation, their location and the characteristics of their migration flows. Our results suggest that rural municipalities which became poorer are rather remote, register a low or negative migratory balance and deficit exchanges with urban centres. Arrivals of retirees are not sufficient to offset departures of working categories (executives, blue collars and intermediate professions). Our results also indicate that rural municipalities with growing income are heterogeneous and include both remote municipalities and municipalities polarised by urban or rural centres. They benefit from positive migratory flows, especially from urban and periurban areas, arising from arrivals of retirees as well as working classes (intermediate professions and executives). These results confirm our assumptions that persistent rural exodus leads to unfavourable income dynamics whereas rural revitalisation process and extended periurbanisation go along with a significant income growth in rural municipalities.