The Value of a Fresh Start: Earnings Persistence and the Migration of Single Mothers
Isaac C. Rischall (CILN)March 1999
Abstract
This paper considers the possibility that migration provides individuals with a fresh start.In other words, I consider a model where the temporary component of earnings is correlated over time and migration causes this correlation to change. Results for single mothers suggest that migration causes the correlation of the temporary components to decline significantly. Furthermore, if one does not control this effect of migration one finds that single mothers decrease their earnings and income by migrating. However, if one considers migration as a fresh start then, on average, a single mother migrants increase their expected earnings and income ten percent by moving.
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