Award-winning student Nathan Kettlewell with his thesis flanked by hi...

Economics honours student rewarded for his original research

A School of Economics honours student, who has a deep interest and concern for the well-being of rural communities, has been awarded a prize for his original research.

Nathan Kettlewell late yesterday (11 February) was awarded the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society (AARES) Undergraduate Prize for NSW.

Nathan has just completed his Bachelor of Commerce (Economics) honours year. The prize was awarded on the basis of his thesis entitled: “The Financial and Non-Financial Outcomes of Rural to Urban Migration in Australia”.

The award was announced and presented to Nathan at the AARES annual conference being held in Adelaide from 10-12 February.

Nathan’s research (supervised by Dr Oleg Yerokhin and Dr Martin O’Brien of the School of Economics) was motivated by his deep interest in, and concern for, the well-being of rural communities.

These are communities which have been confronted with prolonged, stressful drought conditions over recent years that have affected farming communities in many regions across the Australian Continent.

One of the ‘last resort’ strategies of rural families and individuals, when faced with economic hardship is to migrate to another region or to an urban centre.

Nathan developed a theoretical economic model to evaluate the financial and non-financial consequences of rural-to-urban migration. He used data from the HILDA (Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia) panel data survey conducted and maintained by the Melbourne Institute to quantify the effects of migration by rural workers and families.

Among his research findings, Nathan found that male (but not female) rural-to-urban movers experience a financial gain based on weekly (but not hourly) earnings compared with their earning had they not moved.

Nathan also found that female rural-to-urban movers experience an increase in non-financial well-being (based on self-reported well-being levels three years after their move).

Male movers did not experience such gains of well-being. While many rural-to-urban and inter-rural movers did experience some financial improvement, Nathan found no consistent overall improvement in life-satisfaction levels.

He explored the economic policy implications of his research findings.