Causes and Consequences of Return Migration: Recent Evidence from China☆

Abstract Return migration is an integral part of the rural to urban labor migration in China. Using recent household survey data, this paper analyzes the determinants of return migration and the economic behavior of return migrants. The main findings are as follows. First, return migration is of limited scale and out-migration is still dominant. Second, both push and pull factors affect the return decision. Third, return migrants invest significantly more in productive farm assets but are no more likely to engage in local nonfarm activities than are nonmigrants and migrants. These findings suggest that return migrants may play an important role in the modernization process. J. Comp. Econ., June 2002, 30(2), pp. 376–394. China Center for Economic Research, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China. © 2002 Association for Comparative Economic Studies. Published by Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: J61, J24, R23.

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