Abstract
We investigate differences in the mobility behaviour of graduates who completed secondary school in Germany (German, foreign) or abroad (international) and analyse factors that may cause disparities in mobility. Our analysis focuses on job-relevant networks and work experience as they seem to be associated with the area of job search and with migration decisions. Results of an event history analysis show that the proportion of long-term “stayers” in the university region is relatively low among international graduates. Regression results indicate that the probability to leave the region differs depending on individual, study-related and regional factors. Pre-study mobility and work experience in particular turn out to be important predictors. When controlling for these factors, the likelihood of staying in the university region does not significantly differ between German and international graduates. In contrast, foreign graduates who attended school in Germany show a higher propensity to leave the university region in order to enter the labour market than the other graduate groups, conditional on covariates.
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Notes
- 1.
In 2019, more than 10 percent of graduates in Germany had foreign citizenship. This proportion has doubled over the last two decades (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2020b).
- 2.
We use the terms mobility and migration interchangeably. In the empirical analysis, we examine out-migration from the university region.
- 3.
Scheller et al. (2013) note that more than 20 percent of all first-year students at German universities have completed an apprenticeship when enrolling for higher education.
- 4.
In our data, 44 percent of the graduates obtained their higher education entrance certificate in the university region (see Sect. 3). Stöver und Sibbertsen (2018) show that in seven out of sixteen federal states more than 50 percent of the high school graduates moved to another state to start university.
- 5.
- 6.
We refrain from giving a detailed review of the literature on the international mobility of students and graduates because our analysis focuses on interregional mobility within Germany.
- 7.
Furthermore, studies on international migration show that the probability of return migration decreases when migrants have resided in the host country for a longer period of time (e.g., van den Berg & Weynandt, 2013).
- 8.
We cannot identify persons with dual nationality in our data. Furthermore, a potential fourth group of graduates, persons with German citizenship who obtained their university entry certificate abroad, is not represented in the data.
- 9.
We assume that the mobility behaviour of this group differs significantly from that of the majority of graduates. These older graduates are likely to have entered the labour market already before starting university. Moreover, we assume that there are important differences with respect to family status, a characteristic we do not record.
- 10.
- 11.
These results closely resemble the distribution across fields of study in official administrative university data, see Statistisches Bundesamt (2020a).
- 12.
In contrast, the results of Busch und Weigert (2010) point to a decrease in migration probability as the age of graduates increases.
- 13.
Applying the estimate of the full model (model 3 in Tab. 5), graduates who moved to the university region when starting university have a 94 percent [(exp(0.662) − 1) × 100] higher probability of taking up a full-time job outside the university region than immobile students, all other things being equal (including the frailty term).
- 14.
As a robustness check, we also included interaction terms between exam grades and fields of study in the three models. The findings on differences between the graduate groups are not affected by this extension of the models.
- 15.
We refer to a more detailed discussion of the corresponding effects in Teichert et al. (2020).
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Niebuhr, A., Otto, A., Rossen, A., Teichert, C. (2022). Post-study migration behaviour: Differences between native, foreign and international university graduates in Germany. In: Jungbauer-Gans, M., Gottburgsen, A. (eds) Regionale Mobilität und Hochschulbildung. Higher Education Research and Science Studies. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-36156-3_5
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