Leaving for Good or Coming Back? Identifying Long‐Term Internal Migration Trajectories of Rural Young Adults in the Netherlands

ABSTRACT To counteract the effects of young adult out‐migration, rural areas are increasingly interested in whether leavers return, and when and why they do so. However, little is known about their migration trajectories after departure. Their out‐migration is often studied as a one‐time event, even though it marks the start of a dynamic life phase with numerous events that potentially lead to residential relocations. To capture long‐term migration trajectories, we provide a more nuanced picture of rural young adult migration by following their residential trajectories from age 17 to 35, using longitudinal register data from Statistics Netherlands. We reveal five common migration patterns after leaving: (1) return migrants, (2) repeat leavers, (3) late leavers, (4) onward migrants, (5) one‐time migrants, alongside a group of non‐migrants: (6) stayers. Partnering with someone from the same area of origin increases the likelihood of return, whereas having a partner from elsewhere is linked to continued migration. Men are more likely to be late leavers or stayers; (applied) university graduates are more likely to have more mobile trajectories; and parenthood raises the likelihood of return migration, repeat leaving, or late leaving, while lowering the likelihood of one‐time migration. Our focus on long‐term trajectories reveals that over half of rural young adult leavers have returned to the rural by age 35. This shows that by and large not all out‐migrants leave the rural for good and suggests that return migrants are a valuable group to target when addressing rural youth out‐migration.