Revisiting the "Dying to Move, or Moving to Die?" Question: A Parallel Process Model of Migration-Mortality Trajectories Mediated by Elderly Populations among United States Counties

William J. Keith, Mississippi State University
Ronald E. Cossman, Mississippi State University
Jeralynn S. Cossman, Mississippi State University

This study expounds on earlier work by Cossman and Cossman on the pace and tempo of migration and mortality population processes, adding to the present body of research a novel method for incorporating correlates of each process into a structural equation model. The purpose of this study is threefold: to examine the county-level relationship between mortality and migration processes when significantly mediated by age structure; to establish time order of said age structure effects on migration and mortality, and; to determine whether top-heaviness effects of age structure among US counties are manifest more significantly in migration trajectories or in mortality trajectories. This study will be accomplished by combining NCHS vital statistics with intercensal estimates into a parallel process latent growth model, wherein migration and mortality are assumed to be simultaneously-occuring and mediated by the proportion of a county's population aged at least sixty-five years old.