A geographical path to integration? Exploring the interplay between regional context and labour market integration among refugees in Sweden

Migrant integration is an issue at the forefront of political debates in many immigrant-receiving countries. Within academia, a rich body of neighbourhood effects literature examines the significance of the residential environment for the socioeconomic integration of international migrants. Another strand of research explores the associations between immigrants’ initial region of residence and their subsequent socioeconomic integration. Existing research focuses on a single dimension of geographical context and on the neighbourhood scale. Using Swedish longitudinal register data, we estimate discrete-time event history models to assess how regional and neighbourhood contexts influence refugees’ entry into employment. Our study includes all refugees who arrived in Sweden between 2000 and 2009, distinguishing between three categories of refugees: refugees with assigned housing, refugees with self-arranged housing and quota refugees. Our results reveal a clear pattern where the most advantageous regions for finding a first employment are those at the extremes of the population density distribution: the Stockholm region and small city/rural regions. Refugees residing in Malmö have the lowest probability of entering the labour market. Our study also reiterates existing concerns regarding the negative effects of ethnic segregation at the neighbourhood level on labour market participation