Migration mobility of population and its measurement

The article substantiates the necessity of delineating the concepts of “migration mobility” and “population migration”, which are different in meaning. It shows when and how the Russian academic literature has formulated the statement that there are fundamental differences between these concepts. On the basis of the available interpretations of the term “mobility”, the authors express the opinion that mobility is a concept denoting such a phenomenon as the potential readiness of population to change their territorial status. Offering this interpretation of mobility, the authors proceeded from the following scheme: in the beginning, the phenomenon itself is identified, then, after highlighting its essential properties, the concept is formulated and only then the most appropriate term is chosen for it. The article shows that migration mobility, whatever it is measured in, or in the distribution of natives of other localities by the number of changes of their place of residence, or in the shares of migrants in the population, including different periods of their stay at the place of residence - it is still just one of the factors in their overall totality, on which to some extent depends the decision to migrate. Migration mobility is measured using various types of indicators, which from the second half of the twentieth century began to be used, such as the number of migratory movements connected with change of the permanent place of residence. This information is provided by sociological surveys, some of which are analyzed in the article, as well as by the Rosstat censuses and micro-censuses of population, which record data on local natives and natives of other places (former migrants), and their chronological structure. The final part of the article shows the relationship between the population structure at the time of settlement and the indicators of the intensity of migration.