Analysis of intermetropolitan labour force migration in Canada, 1971-76

Abstract

<p>Interregional and intermetropolitan migration have long been modelled in an econometric framework in which the migrant is assumed to invest in migration if it is to his economic advantage to do so. Such an approach, commonly identified as human capital theory, is employed here as the basis of an examination of intermetropolitan male labour force migration in Canada for the period 1971-76. Analysis of the mobility rates over the period holds few surprises and serves to reinforce the noted trend at the provincial level of a basic shift in population westward to Alberta and British Colmbia. Ontario has lost its position of dominance, Quebec and the prairie region continue to lose population and eastern Canada appears to be holding its own. The motivations of inter-CMA migrants do, however, bear closer scrutiny, as the conclusion reached here through least-squares modelling is that the migrant population may have shifted in its oritentation from migration based on chance or speculation to movement to certain employment, laced with a liberal amount of return migration. The argument behind this conclusion is rooted in the economic climate of the period. Further studies will face as their greatest handicaps defining and operationalizing such variables as psychic factors, risk and uncertainty; and the absence in census data sources of information pertaining to multiple or return migration.</p>