ИСТИНА

Huge disproportions in income and life conditions in regions of Russia force people to move. Undeveloped housing market and some other reasons retain internal migration and lead to phenomena of internal circular migration. It was impossible in USSR because of strict registration system, but was common at the end of 19 century. Many peasants left their regions in summer to find some work in capital or other large cities and came back in winter. There were about 40-60% male inhabitants working as “otkhodnics” (internal circular migrants) in some regions in central Russia. Modern internal circular migration in Russia has another frequency. Usually migrants return home each 2-3 weeks. The lack of statistics about modern “otkhodnics” makes scientists give only approximate assessments (4-20 million people or 7-25% of employers, it depends on criteria and methods of analysis). First critical studies of modern internal circular migration regarded “otkhodnics” as future migrants. Our field studies, including about 60 expert interviews with local government, employees and actually “otkhodnics”, show many different ways of internal circular migration development. Some of “otkhodnics” really moved to big cities, some of them turned to the local labour market at the first opportunity or tried to find work as close to their homes as possible. Some of them earned enough money to open the own business at home. Another point of discussion is social effect of internal circular migration. On the one hand, it works as social attainment and helps many people from periphery change their lifestyle and have a large income. On the other hand, many “otkhodnics” loose their qualification and get overvalued income expectations, so that many local employees prefer not to recruit formal “otkhodnics”. A special point of interest is influence of circular migration on family relations