Career and Geographic Mobility Interactions: Implications for the Age Selectivity of Migration

The age selectivity of migration is often observed in empirical studies of labor mobility in the United States. In this paper we analyze the interactive dimensions of geographic and career mobility while at the same time examining the associated implications of these interactions for the age selectivity of migration. The analyses deal with interstate migration of employed members of the labor force for the period 1965 to 1970. The results indicate significant connections between geographic and career mobility, and that a failure to recognize those interactions overstates the negative influence of age on migration propensity. "The significance of occupational differential lies... in the extent to which change of occupation [to also include change of industry] is a concomitant of migration." Dorothy Swaine Thomas, 1938 [21, p. 126].