The reason why people migrate

There is always a certain reason or motive for people to migrate and change their places of residence. Understanding the reasons for people's migration is the basis for us to deal with population migration and better serve immigrants. As a common phenomenon in human society, human migration behavior has some basic laws. People have formed many theoretical understandings about the flow direction, scale, motivation and social impact of population migration.

1, immigration law

In reality, especially in modern society, we always see people moving from one place to another, even ourselves. We can't help asking: Who is moving? Where did they move? Why did they move?

In response to these problems, British scholar Levenshtein (such as

Ravenstein) put forward the theory of population migration in19th century. He summed up the law of social population migration as follows: 1) Migration is mainly short-distance migration, and long-distance migration is migration to large industrial and commercial centers. Compared with the center that attracts immigrants, the closer the distance, the more immigrants will move in. On the contrary, the farther the distance, the fewer immigrants move in, and the number of immigrants is inversely proportional to the distance. 2) Migration is often staged. As far as a town is concerned, firstly, people from surrounding rural areas move in, and then immigrants from distant rural areas gradually move into the rural areas around the town; 3) Migration flow and reverse migration flow coexist at the same time, but the net migration flow usually flows from rural areas to cities. In general, immigrants who migrate to a region also have reverse migration; 4) Female groups have certain advantages in short-distance migration; 5) The development of transportation, communication and technology has increased mobility; 6) Favorable economic factors are the most important factors to attract immigrants.

American scholar Lee (E.S. Lee)

Based on Levenshtein's theory, a more detailed migration model is proposed. He defined immigration as a permanent or semi-permanent change in people's place of residence. He believes that there are four factors related to people's migration and affect migration: first, factors related to migration destination; Second, the factors related to the migration of the original residence; Third, it is related to the factors between the migration destination and the original residence, and fourth, it is related to the individual migrants. In the above four aspects, there are positive factors (+) that are beneficial to migration, negative factors (-) that are unfavorable to migration and ineffective neutral factors (0). The contest and synthesis of positive and negative factors contributed to the final migration.

According to this basic principle, Li further pointed out some laws of population migration: 1) The scale of population migration varies with the differences between the two places, and the greater the natural, geographical and socio-economic differences between the two places, the greater the scale of population migration. For example, between rural areas and cities, the social structure is very different and the migration volume is relatively large. 2) The scale of population migration varies with the structure and characteristics of population groups. Different ages, genders and occupational groups have different immigration volumes. Large-scale migration of population to one direction or destination forms migration flow. 3) The obstacles in the middle are directly related to migration. 4) When a large migration flow is formed, a reverse migration flow will inevitably occur, that is, after a large number of people move out of a certain place, people from other areas move in to compensate. The scale of population migration changes with the change of economic factors. In the period of economic prosperity, the scale of population migration is large, while in the period of economic recession, the amount of population migration is small. 5) Except for special compulsion, the scale and mobility of population migration increase with the delay of time. 6) With the different stages of a country's social and economic development, the scale and rate of migration are also changing.

2. Migration motivation

What drives people to migrate? In this regard, there is a popular "push-pull theory" that there are two fundamental reasons for people's migration: thrust and tension. The negative factors of the emigration place play a driving role, pushing the emigrants away from their original residence. These negative factors mainly include: 1) the exhaustion of natural resources, 2) the increase of agricultural production costs, 3) the surplus of rural labor force, 4) the decrease of income level, and so on. The positive factors of the migration place play a pulling role on the migrants, mainly including: 1) more employment opportunities, 2) higher income level, 3) better culture and public facilities, 4) better education conditions and so on. However, the place of emigration is not completely full of negative factors, and some factors need to be preserved, such as familiar environment and interpersonal network. Similarly, there are negative factors of exclusion in immigrant areas, such as unfamiliar environment, fierce competition and pressure of life. The choice of immigrants is often made after weighing the advantages and disadvantages of both sides.

In population migration, rural to urban migration is usually more common. As for the reasons for this migration, Lewis put forward the theory of dual development, arguing that the traditional agricultural sector and modern industrial sector coexist in developing countries. Because the resources that traditional departments rely on for production are non-renewable, and the economic benefits increase slowly, with the population growth, there will be zero-value labor; On the contrary, the scale of modern departments is constantly expanding, and the demand for labor will increase, thus providing an important channel for the transformation of labor in traditional departments. On the basis of Lewis model, Jinghan Fei and Ranis put forward the model of agricultural surplus labor force. In their view, Lewis did not see that the improvement of agricultural labor productivity and the growth of agricultural surplus products were prerequisites for the agricultural labor force to turn to the modern sector. Jinghan Fei and Ranis believe that the transformation of dual structure and the transfer of rural surplus labor force can be divided into three stages: the stage of agricultural surplus labor force and unlimited supply, the stage of food shortage and rising prices of agricultural products, and the stage of agricultural industrialization.

But Todaro, an American economist, thinks that in developing countries, if the labor force can flow freely (except China), the migration of rural labor force to cities will often occur. Due to the difference in the average wage rate between urban and rural areas, there is an obvious gap in the actual income of urban and rural residents. Therefore, even if the urban unemployment rate is high, rural residents still have high expectations for the possibility of finding jobs in cities. Therefore, in order to avoid the huge social cost that may be brought by the excessive flow of urban and rural population, we should create an environment of urban and rural economic balance in institutional arrangements and eliminate absolute poverty and unfair distribution.

3. Factors affecting migration

In order to further grasp the law of population migration, scientifically regulate and intervene the process of population migration, and make the migration behavior orderly, it is necessary to scientifically understand the factors that affect people's choice of migration behavior.

Theoretically speaking, the factors that affect population migration are generally nothing more than three aspects: one is personal factors, the other is urban factors or immigration factors, and the third is rural factors or emigration factors.

Table 8- 1: Main factors affecting migration

Individuals, cities or immigrants, rural areas or immigrants.

Birthplace, gender, age, race, family, marriage, number of children, education level ... age and marital status of the place where you moved in, year of migration, occupation before migration, income before migration, migration expectation, migration of other family members, migration expenses, migration information source, migration expenses source, new means of earning a living, time to establish an independent economic source, frequency of returning to the original residence, and original residence.

Immigration history, family assets, wage income, employment history, land scale, and understanding of opportunities in other places. ...

For the floating population, the main motivation for deciding whether to migrate or not is not the supply and demand situation in the labor market, but the potential difference in social living conditions between the two places.

Table 8-2: Factors Influencing Migration Behavior Decision

Potential costs and benefits of migration decisions