Internal migration in Scotland and the UK: trends and policy lessons

Appendix A: The Labour Force Survey

Compared with the National Health Service Central Register (NHSCR), greater detail on those who move between Scotland and rUK is available from the Labour Force Survey. This dataset is published by the Office for National Statistics and is used to derive the regularly published labour market aggregates such as the level of employment and the unemployment rate. A wide range of data is collected from respondents such as the qualifications, industry and occupation (if employed) and also, particularly relevant for this study, whether they have recently moved.

Labour Force Survey data is collected continuously from adults in households and made available to researchers each quarter. The data that are used in this exercise cover the period 2007 Q1 to 2019 Q2. They comprise 933,000 individual cases, 79,000 of which were resident in Scotland at the time of the survey. The question relating to migration that each adult is asked is whether they are resident in the same region as they wear 12 months previously. For this question, the UK is subdivided into 19 regions, two of which are in Scotland, namely “Strathclyde” and “Rest of Scotland”.

For detailed information on the study see: Labour Force survey user guidance

Visualisations

2011 Census Data: Scotland

Data: 5% sample

Scotland, N= 261,816

Migrants from rUK, N=2,138

Migrants from overseas, N=3,118

Source: The 2001 Census Microdata (a 5% sample, individuals aged 16-74).