Devanto Shasta Pratomo,

Brawijaya University,

Malang, Indonesia,

E-mail: dede_gsu02@yahoo.com

Can Rural-Urban Migrants Escape from Poverty? Evidence from Four Indonesian Cities

Abstract. This study examines the probability of rural-urban migrants in Indonesia living under  poverty at destination. The poverty levels is divided into three categories including poor households, near-poor households, and non-poor households, basing on the definition of Indonesian Central Bureau of Statistics’s poverty lines using the expenditure approach. Using Rural-Urban Migration of Indonesia and China (RUMiCI) 2011 data, the findings show that migrants tend to be categorized as non-poor as compared to non-migrants. The important factors that help migrants to escape from poverty include  education of household heads, the number of dependents, and previous working experience in the modern sectors.

Received: December, 2017

1st Revision: March, 2018

Accepted: May, 2018

DOI: 10.14254/2071-789X.2018/11-2/12

JEL Classification: I32, J61, R23

Keywords: poverty; migration; rural-urban migrants