Holding the door slightly open: Germany's migrants' return intentions and realizations

Abstract

Return migration intentions are complex and are not necessarily followed by future return migration. This study compares successful return or repeated migration with self-declared return intentions. It takes advantage of the latest and unique German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) survey dropout studies and fieldwork to observe a wider return migration window than reported in the literature to answer the question of whether return migration intentions eventually coincided with actual emigration behaviours. Moreover, return migration estimates are examined over this long-observed return window. This empirical analysis explores (1) whether return intentions eventually materialize, (2) whether they can eventually predict actual return behaviours and (3) whether the determinants of actual and predicted return based on intentions are similar. Overall, my results support that migration intentions can predict actual return behaviour. While the underlying results show discrepancies in the predictors of return intentions and those of actual returns, they show emigration intentions as significant predictors of actual future emigration. Moreover, the findings suggest that life satisfaction significantly correlates with the individual intention to remigrate. Both effects are highly significant.