Spatial Migration Experience and Turnover Intention: Empirical Evidence from Japan

Abstract

Migration experience has a profound impact on psychological health and well-being, but relatively little is known about how spatial relocation affects turnover intention in the labor market. This study attempted to examine the effects of spatial migration experience on turnover intention. Using individual-level survey data on people's migration experience and career development from Japan, we verified the central hypothesis that internal migration has positive effects on later turnover intention by employing both linear and ordered probit regressions. Further, several robustness checks were conducted in order to address endogeneity issues. We first corrected for the self-selection bias in two ways, adding the number of companies worked for as a control variable to partly capture the individual psychological factors and estimating with the treatment effects model. Then a sub-sample regression was used to eliminate the bias from active migration due to job change. All confirmed the positive effect of migration experience on turnover intention.