Welcome back! The impact of ‘return initiatives’ on return migration to rural regions

Abstract This article studies the effect of return initiatives in rural regions of Germany on interregional return migration. The initiatives aim to increase return migration by, amongst other things, providing information on local employment opportunities and personal support to workers interested in returning to find a job in the former rural region of residence. Analysing administrative data on individual labour market trajectories through survival analysis and difference-in-differences estimation, we find that return initiatives, on average, promote interregional return migration. Among the considered workers, particularly those in the middle and at the top of the wage distribution are more likely to return.