Description:

*Please note the seminar start and end time has changed to 3:45 - 5:15*

Allison Green (Princeton): Networks and Geographic Mobility: Evidence from World War II Navy Ships 

Abstract: This paper uses quasi-random assignment to World War II Navy ships during World War II to study how personal networks shape migration patterns. Using newly constructed data on 1.4 million sailors, I measure exposure to geographically diverse shipmates and estimate its impact on post-war migration. A one-standard-deviation increase in a sailor's exposure to shipmates from different states raises the probability of out-migration from his own state by 4-5% by 1950. Effects on directed migration are larger but heterogeneous by destination, increasing moves to fast-growing Census divisions by over 15%. I then estimate a discrete choice migration model with embedded networks, revealing Navy ties encouraged long-distance moves, in part substituting short-distance moves that would have otherwise occurred.Using variation from Navy networks to construct instruments for the probability of migrating, I estimate large returns to network-facilitated migration, suggesting Navy ties enabled moves to higher-opportunity areas.