ABSTRACT
Economists have generally used a two-sector model to explain the rural-to-urban migration of labor at the aggregate or regional level, and the labor supply and demand conditions in the urban areas (Todaro 1969; Sjaastad 1961, 1962; Sahota 1968; Berry 1970; Mehmet 1976; and Banerjee 1981). In most of the models, the focus is on the individual, who is assumed to maximize his or her utility or income while deciding about whether and where to migrate. However, in recent years, some studies (for example. Mincer 1978) have drawn attention to family considerations in migration decisions in the context of a nuclear family in which both husband and wife work. The Mincer model assumes that migration decisions involve the movement of the entire (nuclear) family. In such a situation, movement of one individual, or a part of the family, to maximize the individual's utility or income may result in the upsetting or even the breaking down of the family unit. However, this does not hold for most of the African and Asian rural societies in which the extended family system is still the rule and the household acquires a multicentered character. The migratory behavior of individual members reflect, in such settings, family decisions. Often, even after the household member migrates, he generally maintains an essential link with the household through: (a) frequent visits to the home village with "gifts" of all sorts for the parents and other relatives, and (b) money remittances (Banerjee 1981; Singh 1978, 1981). Such a unique relationship adds another dimension to the migration process not found in the more industrialized societies. Therefore, the household characteristics and constraints that may shape family migratory decisions cannot be ignored, although the fact 86is that most past studies have, for the lack of household level data, ignored such characteristics and relied on aggregate regional data.
