Social Welfare, Phantom Voters, and Internal Migration in Taiwan — Evidence from Panel Spatial Analysis

Abstract

This paper aims to investigate the following two issues related to internal migration in Taiwan: one is the widely discussed issue of the existence of magnetic effects induced by welfare benefits and the other is a rarely discussed issue of the existence of phantom voters. Using panel data for 23 counties and cities from 1995 to 2010 and estimating three fixed-effects spatial Durbin models, the primary findings of this study are that, by keeping other factors constant and considering the spatial dependence of migration, welfare migration is found to exist, particularly for females, and the number of phantom voters in an election year can significantly affect internal migration in Taiwan.