Commuting farther and earning more? How employment density moderates workers' commuting distance

Arbeitspapier

Over the past several decades, most industrialized countries have experienced a rise in commuting distances, spurring scholarly interest in its determinants. The primary theoretical explanation for longer commuting distances is based on higher wages; however, empirical evidence is minimal. We argue that commuting indeed often results from changes to jobs with higher wages. However, local labor market opportunities strongly moderate individuals' responsiveness to wage changes, resulting in diverse wage effects determined by the place of residence. Using German survey data linked to administrative information with a mixed-effects design, we find that when changing jobs the effect of wages on commuting distances rises substantially according to the local labor market density. While residents in the least dense areas do not adjust their commuting distance substantially in response to a wage change, residents in areas with the highest employment density are highly responsive. This result indicates the need to take into account the regional labor market structure when analyzing commuting patterns as local opportunities strongly influence the adjustment process of commuting distances. Particularly commuters from economic centers seem to adjust their distances to a great degree.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: IAB-Discussion Paper ; No. 33/2015

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Geographic Labor Mobility; Immigrant Workers ; Job, Occupational, and Intergenerational Mobility; Promotion ; Size and Spatial Distributions of Regional Economic Activity ; Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics: Regional Migration; Regional Labor Markets; Population; Neighborhood Characteristics
• Thema: commuting distances ; wage effects ; labor market density ; mixed-effects models

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Reichelt, Malte ; Haas, Anette
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB)
• (wo): Nürnberg
• (wann): 2015

Weitere Informationen

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/126532
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:43 MEZ