ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on mobility in rural populations, the larger context of retirement migration will often intrude because the theoretical and methodological problems of the general often apply to the specific. The study of the mobility patterns of rural elders, therefore, is a special piece of the large puzzle of old age mobility, with its own set of theoretical and methodological issues and dilemmas. The increasing age of children in the home, particularly once they begin their formal schooling, dampens the attractiveness of migration for their parents. Migration is the major short-term driver of age-specific population change in small areas. The study of geographic mobility within demography has been most influenced by economic issues. From a demographic perspective, migration is the major mechanism that redistributes the labor force. The gerontological perspective on geographic mobility is concerned with the impact of migrants on the local economy, but it seeks this impact less in employment than in consumption.
