Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics

Umeå Economic Studies,
Umeå University, Department of Economics

No 929: The Effect of Moving during Childhood on Long Run Income: Evidence from Swedish Register Data

Stefanie Heidrich ()
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Stefanie Heidrich: Department of Economics, Umeå University, Postal: Department of Economics, Umeå University, S 901 87 Umeå, Sweden

Abstract: In this paper I study the long-term effects of inter-municipal moving during childhood on income using Swedish register data. Due to the richness of the data I am able to control for important sources of selection into moving, such as parent separation, parents’ unemployment, education, long run income, and immigration background. I find that children’s long run incomes are significantly negatively affected by moving during childhood, and the effect is larger for those who move more often. For children who move once, I also estimate the effect of the timing and the quality of the move. I measure the quality of each neighborhood based on the adult outcomes for individuals who never move; the quality of a move follows as the difference in quality between the origin and the destination. Given that a family moves, I find that the negative effect of childhood moving on adult income is increasing in age at move. Children benefit economically from the quality of the region they move to only if they move before age 12 (sons) and age 16 (daughters).

Keywords: long-term effects of moving; disruption costs; neighborhood effects; human capital; child development

JEL-codes: D31; J17; J24; J62; R23

31 pages, May 18, 2016

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