A model of interregional migration under the presence of natural resources: theory and evidence from Russia

摘要

Internal net-migration rates in Russia are negatively correlated with regional labour shares in mining. In order to explain this phenomenon theoretically and empirically, Crozet's (J Econ Geogr 4:439-458, 2004) theoretical model is augmented by the mining of natural resources to allow for exogenous market developments and spatially bounded production. The model is directly transformed into an econometric panel specification and tested for 78 Russian regions for the observation period 2004-2010. The empirical results show that the mining of natural resources attracts internal migrants, while regional price-indexes have unexpected positive effects.