Women's migration in Iran: the level, trend and socio-demographic correlates

Hossein Mahmoudian, University of Tehran

Women in Iran have been experiencing a high level of educational attainment, higher mean age at marriage, and a low level of fertility during last decades. Using Iran census data, this paper aims to examine the level, trend and socio-demographic correlates of women's migration. The level of the migration in Iran has increased during recent years. According to census data, about a half of internal migrants during 2006-2011 were women while women had comprised about 45% of migrants during preceding census interval. The majority of them (about 80%) have migrated as accompanies of other migrants (namely male head of the household). About 14% of them have migrated due to reasons related to work, education, and better life. Work migrants were more likely to be 30-40 years old, divorcee, with university education (MA and more), and graduated in fields of education and health. Those who were in 15-25 age group, never married, with university education, and graduated in fields of agriculture, engineering, and social sciences were more likely to migrate for education. It seems that the chance of migration for women will increase because of the educational attainment, later marriage, relatively high level of family dissolution, and the below-replacement fertility. However, the lack of proper responses of the society to the migration (like higher level of women's unemployment) may negatively affect the migration.