Forty years of internal migration in Australian regions: a sequence analysis of net migration, turnover, and retention

Australia is one of the most migratory countries in the world, yet as internal migrants typically represent only a small proportion of the population, the impact of stayers and transient populations need to be considered to create a fuller picture of regional population dynamics. To that end, this paper analyses net migration, population turnover, and population retention for 69 Australian regions from 1976 to 2016. Applying sequence analysis to a temporally-consistent framework, we find that regions follow four ideal-typical trajectories: 1) escalator regions with transient populations, 2) amenity destinations with fading attractiveness, 3) regions at risk of terminal decline, and 4) sticky regions. This classification in part follows the urban hierarchy while unveiling some important regional differences, highlighting the utility of the long-term multi-dimensional framework developed in this paper. This approach offers policymakers a new capacity to measure and monitor changes in internal migration and population dynamics to design and deploy more targeted regional policies.