Romancing the elderly : place characteristics as lures for retired potential inmigrants [i.e. immigrants]

Today's elderly American population is greater in number than the combined populations of 20 of the U.S.'s 50 states and the entire population of Canada (1). As this group continues to grow — 25% of America's population will be at least 55 years old by 2030 — along with the propensity toward interstate retirement migration, vast demographic shifts are likely to occur (90). This phenomenon will have, and has had, an important bearing on local economies due to both the contribution of older people to an area's economic and tax base and to the required composition of publicly provided goods and services necessitated by their presence or absence. Due to the relatively great wealth and human capital of the average elderly interstate migrant, it would behoove economic planners to attempt to attract elderly migrants to their areas as well as to encourage local senior citizens not to move away. To do so, knowledge about which place characteristics figure dominantly in elderly migration decisions is needed. The study reported on in this dissertation was designed to further such knowledge. In it place characteristics of areas that have attracted large numbers of elderly migrants in the past were examined in light of the personal characteristics of their residents in order to determine which area traits had a significant impact on retirement immigration decisions between 1975 and 1980. Seven characteristics were identified as significant factors in elderly migration decisions. These characteristics were a locality's 1) number of cold days annually; 2) residential property tax rate; 3) monthly median rent level; 4) rate of population growth between 1960 and 1970; 5) miles of coastline and square miles of inland water; 6) acres of national forests, parks, and wildlife refuges and number of state parks; and 7) percent of population resident in urban areas. An ordinal ranking of the importance of these seven characteristics to potential elderly immigrants spotlighted the rate of population change between 1960 and 1970 (which serves as a proxy for the presence of friends and relatives in an area), number of cold days, median rent level, and percent of a locality's population in urban areas as the most important factors to elderly decision makers. Of the characteristics found to be significant to elderly potential migrants, only an area's residential property tax rate, median rent level, rate of population growth between 1960 and 1970, and percent of population resident in urban areas were shown to significantly affect the migration decisions of a younger control group of potential migrants that was examined.