Family migration in a cross-national perspective: The importance of within-couple employment arrangements in Australia, Britain, Germany, and Sweden

OBJECTIVE Migration rates of dual-earner couples are lower than those of male-breadwinner couples. We revisit this issue using a cross-national comparative perspective and examine heterogeneity in the role of female employment in couple relocations. We propose a theoretical framework in which national levels of support for female employment and normative expectations about gender roles act as moderators of the relationship between couple type (i.e., dual-earner and male-breadwinner) and family migration.

METHODS We deploy discrete-time event history analyses of harmonised longitudinal data from four large-scale datasets from Australia, Britain, Germany, and Sweden, covering the 1992‒2011 period.

RESULTS Consistent with prior research, we find that male-breadwinner couples migrate more often than dual-earner couples in all countries, suggesting that traditional gender structures affecting family migration operate across very different contexts. We also find cross-country differences in the estimated effects of different sorts of absolute and relative partner resources on family migration.

CONCLUSIONS We take our results as preliminary evidence that national contexts can serve as moderators of the relationship between within-couple employment arrangements and family migration decisions.

CONTRIBUTION Our study contributes to family migration literature by illustrating how cross-national comparisons are a valuable methodological approach to put prevailing micro-level explanations of the relationship between female employment and family migration in context.