WAGES, EASE OF FINDING A JOB OR DISTANCE FROM HOME? WHAT DETERMINES THE PLACE OF WORK IN POLAND BY ECONOMIC EMIGRANTS FROM UKRAINE

Abstract

For several years, a high dynamics of growth in the number of foreigners from Eastern European countries taking up employment in Poland has been visible. Undoubtedly, the decline in unemployment, which translates into the ease of finding a job, and the systematic increase in the average salary have an impact on this situation. The aim of this article is to check what and to what extent influences the decision to work by Ukrainian citizens in different regions of the country. This study focuses on three key factors – how the scale of immigration to a given poviat is influenced by the distance at which migrations are undertaken, the level of wages and unemployment in the examined poviats. To achieve the above goal, a popular model describing migrations as a function of geographical distance, called the gravity model, was used. The results of the analysis show that wages are a significant stimulus of economic migration to Poland, and the level of unemployment had a destimulating effect. The estimated values of the parameters indicate a much stronger attracting effect of the level of wages than the impact of unemployment on the migration inflow. Geographic distance is a factor that also limits the intensity of movements. However – as the analysis showed – its limiting influence is much smaller than that of unemployment.