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Life (Dis)satisfaction and the Decision to Migrate: Evidence from Central and Eastern Europe

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  • Vladimir Otrachshenko
  • Olga Popova

Abstract

This paper provides the first evidence regarding the impact of life satisfaction on the individual intention to migrate. The impact of individual characteristics and country macroeconomic variables on the decision to migrate is analyzed in one framework.Differently from other studies, we allow for life satisfaction to serve as a mediator between macroeconomic variables and the intention to migrate. Using the Eurobarometer Survey for 27 Central Eastern (CEE) and Western European (non-CEE) countries, we test the predictions of our theoretical model and find that dissatisfied with life, people have a higher intention to migrate. The macroeconomic conditions have an effect on the intention to migrate indirectly through life satisfaction. At all levels of life satisfaction, unemployed, middle-aged individuals with a low or average income from urban areas at all levels of education are found to have higher intentions to migrate from CEE countries than from non-CEE countries.

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Paper provided by The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economic Institute, Prague in its series CERGE-EI Working Papers with number wp460.

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Date of creation: Apr 2012
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Handle: RePEc:cer:papers:wp460
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Keywords: life satisfaction; migration; decision making;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
  • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being
  • J61 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers

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Cited by:

  1. Michael Landesmann & Isilda Mara, 2013. "Do I Stay because I am Happy or am I Happy because I Stay? Life Satisfaction in Migration, and the Decision to Stay Permanently, Return and Out-migrate," wiiw Working Papers 103, The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies, wiiw.
  2. Olga Popova, 2010. "Can Religion Insure against Aggregate Shocks to Happiness? The Case of Transition Countries," CERGE-EI Working Papers wp425, The Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education - Economic Institute, Prague.
  3. Guzi, Martin & de Pedraza, Pablo, 2013. "A Web Survey Analysis of the Subjective Well-being of Spanish Workers," IZA Discussion Papers 7618, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  4. Nikolova, Milena & Graham, Carol Lee, 2014. "In Transit: The Well-Being of Migrants from Transition and Post-Transition Countries," IZA Discussion Papers 8520, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).
  5. Ruohong Cai & Neli Esipova & Michael Oppenheimer & Shuaizhang Feng, 2014. "International migration desires related to subjective well-being," IZA Journal of Migration, Springer, vol. 3(1), pages 1-20, December.
  6. Artjoms Ivlevs, 2014. "Happy moves? Assessing the impact of subjective well-being on the emigration decision," Working Papers 20141402, Department of Accounting, Economics and Finance, Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, Bristol.
  7. Salahodjaev, Raufhon, 2014. "Can religion buy happiness? The case of Singapore," MPRA Paper 56777, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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