This review paper examines the link between internal migration and regional labour market adjustment. It outlines the motivation and scope of our enquiry, discusses the three key questions that we plan to pursue, reviews relevant international and New Zealand literature, and outlines proposals...

Will economic integration lead to skilled citizens being drawn to the larger, richer economic partner? In 1983, Australia and New Zealand signed the Closer Economic Relations Agreement to ensure free trade in goods and services. Was this a modern equivalent of Horace Greeley's famous advice "Go...

This paper adopts a vector autoregressive (VAR) approach to analyse the labour market adjustment mechanisms for 12 New Zealand regions over the period 1985 to 2001. It examines the effects of a region-specific shock to employment on itself, the unemployment rate, the participation rate, and the...

This paper explores the “brain drain” hypothesis – the idea that New Zealand is losing many of its most talented citizens to other countries. We conclude that we are experiencing more of a brain exchange than a brain drain. There have been net outflows of New Zealand citizens for forty...