Per capita income convergence and internal migration in Spain: Are foreign-born migrants playing an important role?

This paper aims to analyse the role played by internal migration of the foreign-born population in the process of income convergence at provincial level in Spain over the period 1996-2005. First, it examines, using both classical and recent analytical approaches, the provincial income convergence process. Second, the paper gives a succinct description of recent trends in foreign-born internal migration. Third, the influence of these migration flows on provincial income convergence is addressed by estimating several convergence equations. The results of this analysis seem to reject the hypothesis that foreign-born internal migration exerts a strong influence on the income convergence process.