Internal migration and public policy

This paper studies the relation between internal migration and public spending on public goods. We describe centralized public policy when a central government is comprised of elected representatives from local electoral districts. Internal migration determines the median voter in the districts. The median voters decide the equilibrium policy through bargaining. We find the conditions under which exogenous inter-jurisdictional migration results in larger or smaller public spending. The paper also studies whether and when inter-regional migration leads to the efficient policy outcome. We find that the efficient size of government spending depends on the way internal migration leads to convergence among the regional median incomes and the national average income.