Internal Migration, Urban Labour Markets Informalization and Welfare in Ghana

Ghana has rapidly experienced urban transition over the past decade with more than half of the population living in the urban areas and the proportion is even higher for the migrant population. This transition presents more challenges than opportunities to the few big cities which have over expanded to the detriment of several smaller cities in Ghana.  Using the last two waves of the Ghana Living Standards Surveys (GLSS  6 and GLSS 7) and the Population and Housing Census-2021, this study seeks to investigate the nexuses between internal migration, urban informal labour market and welfare in Ghana. In the first essay, the study identifies the pathways through which internal migration contributes to the urban transition process and further examines their determinants in an extended probit and multinomial logit estimation techniques.  In the second   essay, the study will focus on how internal migration contributes to the informalization of the urban labour markets in Ghana and assess the channels through which this occurs using an extended probit  technique. We further examine the determinants of urban labour markets structural transformation of internal migrants in the urban transition process.  In the final essay of the study, we will focus on examining the channels through which internal migration and urban informal labour markets affect migrant’s welfare in Ghana using the Copula-Based Maximum Likelihood sample selection procedure and Multinomial logit with endogenous switching estimation techniques. This outcome of this study can help to inform government policy direction in pursuing the UN-Habitat “sustainable urban settlement for all” agenda in Ghana.

Key Words: Internal Migration; Urban Labour Markets; Informalization; and Welfare