Abstract
Although Swedish housing standards are high and young adults leave the parental home relatively early, there are indications that for certain groups housing has, in recent years, become less accessible. We analyse how housing characteristics affect intermunicipal mobility for different age cohorts and estimate a panel data gravity model that models migration as a function of origin and destination characteristics. The results suggest that new construction in the past two decades has negatively affected migration within commuting regions more than migration between commuting regions. For metropolitan areas, there are considerable negative effects on net migration from other commuter regions because new construction has not kept pace with population growth. The effects are stronger for young adults (20-44) compared to older adults (45-74). Further, we find that, while new construction stimulates mobility for all age cohorts, the estimated relationship is weaker for the youngest adults; indicating a need for more variation in new construction to satisfy different needs. Also, we find that the decreased share of rentals since 1992 have negatively affected the short-distance mobility of the youngest adults while the effect is weaker or even positive for the remaining age cohorts.
Highlights
In recent years, the Swedish public has witnessed an intensified public debate on housing, provoked by low levels of new construction over two full decades
We know that young adults have relatively low incomes4 and the decreasing share of rentals over the past two decades may affect the mobility of different age cohorts differently, as young people are overrepresented in the rental sector
The employment variables are insignificant or with the “wrong” sign for the remaining age cohorts.23Overall though, the results suggest that job market considerations are more important for long-distance moves than for short-distance moves and for younger adults than for older adults, which is in line with previous research (Hansen and Niedomysl, 2011; Mitze and Reinkowski 2011)
Summary
The Swedish public has witnessed an intensified public debate on housing, provoked by low levels of new construction over two full decades. The question we address in this paper is whether housing market characteristics affect the mobility of different age cohorts differently. We investigate how changes in the size of the existing stock of dwellings (per capita), the level of new construction (per capita), and the tenure distribution (the share of rented dwellings) is related to intermunicipal migration for different age cohorts (20–24, 25–34, 35–44, 45–54, 55–64, and 65–74). We know that young adults have relatively low incomes and the decreasing share of rentals over the past two decades may affect the mobility of different age cohorts differently, as young people are overrepresented in the rental sector. Section five presents the empirical results, and section six concludes
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