The information effects of origin on migrants' job search behavior

"Migrants are generally assumed to gather specific information about the destination primarily through physical contact, or through family, friends, and acquaintances. In this paper, I propose an additional source of information: similarities between origin and destination labor markets. Data from the 1983-1987 PSID [Panel Study of Income Dynamics] are used in a two-stage least squares model of postmove search duration in the U.S. Rural-to-urban migrants (except for rural Southerners) exhibit significantly lower search duration than other groups, controlling for productivity-related characteristics and postmove earnings. In addition, employment growth differences between origin and destination are found to be better predictors of search duration than are differences in average earnings."