Should I Stay or Should I Go? Graduate Mobility and Local Economic Dynamics

The present article analyses the effect of social and territorial origin on geographic mobility choices of young people. The objective is to assess the extent to which local economic dynamics influence mobility at entry into higher education and the labour market, and to examine whether this effect varies according to social background. The 2017 Generation survey from Céreq is used to characterise individual mobility trajectories, supplemented with INSEE’s Labour Force surveys to provide a description of the local employment context. The results show that a favourable local economic situation, measured by an index capturing labour demand shocks, reduces post-baccalaureate mobility; however, it has little or no discernible effect at the time of labour market entry. These effects are tempered by social background factors: young people with at least one parent employed at executive level are slightly more responsive to local economic conditions when joining the labour market. Article (pdf, 1 Mo ) Online Appendix (pdf, 745 Ko ) Bernela, B., Bonnal, L., Touré, I. & Tritah, A. (2025). Should I Stay or Should I Go? Graduate Mobility and Local Economic Dynamics. Economie et Statistique / Economics and Statistics , 548, 27–50. doi: 10.24187/ecostat.2025.548.2140