Westward Pull

By Amanda Rohrer
December 2011

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Thousands of people living in western Minnesota cross the border every day to work in North Dakota, home of the nation’s lowest unemployment rate.

Job numbers and unemployment rates are tied to political boundaries, but Minnesotans are not.  Every county in Minnesota has residents who work outside the state. Whether through unconventional work arrangements or — in the case of border residents — because of proximity, a substantial number of Minnesotans work elsewhere.

All border counties have a higher proportion of cross-state commuters than counties that are more centrally located, and the counties that are near or part of a Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) have the highest ratios of residents who depart during the work day. In 2009, 27,182 Minnesotans worked in North Dakota, the most popular out-of-state destination for daily commuters.

As would be expected, most people who commute to North Dakota live in counties bordering the state. The highest concentrations are in Clay, Wilkin, and Polk counties, which are part of or adjacent to the major North Dakota MSAs of Fargo-Moorhead and Grand Forks-East Grand Forks. Minnesota has no major metro areas in the western part of the state, so the border cities of North Dakota attract workers from a substantial slice of Minnesota: Kittson, Marshall, Polk, Red Lake, Norman, Clay, Becker, Wilkin, and Otter Tail counties (see Map 1 and Table 1).

North Dakota’s lowest-in-the-nation 3.5 percent unemployment rate (October 2011) has attracted press coverage and speculation about the state’s economic strength and its draw for struggling workers elsewhere. Over the last decade more Minnesotans have moved to North Dakota than the reverse. That trend has intensified since the start of the recession, with the difference increasing from 690 in 2006 to 8,789 in 2008 before dropping back to 6,075 in 2009 (see Figure 1). Although the trend may be short-lived and fairly volatile, it does illustrate the attraction of the state. 

Commuting patterns, however, don’t reflect a similar trend. Other than a slight dip mid-decade that corresponds with the lowest outflow year, the share of the Minnesota workforce commuting to North Dakota from the analysis area along the border of the two states has remained remarkably consistent at around 26 percent over the past 10 years.

The more populous counties along the border all fall in North Dakota, so commuting patterns are, logically, weighted westward — that is, people in Minnesota commuting to jobs in North Dakota. In the analysis area outlined by a dotted line on Map 1, there were 70,357 positions and 87,884 working residents, so a net 17,527 people leave for jobs outside of the area. The largest share, about two-thirds, commutes westward into North Dakota.

Of the 19,619 people who commute into the study area for jobs, 52 percent are from more eastern counties in Minnesota, while 45 percent are from North Dakota.

While the demographic and income data specific to commuters are limited, the broad overview available hints at some meaningful trends (see Table 2). People under 30 are more likely to leave or come into the area to work than they are to stay there for jobs. Non-commuters, on the other hand, are more likely to fall into the highest age bracket (55 or older). Whether they’ve had time to move closer to their place of work or their experience allows them greater flexibility in finding work near home, non-commuting Minnesotans are older overall.

Few people cross state lines for the lowest-wage jobs. Those earning less than $1,250 a month (about $15,000 annually) make up a significantly smaller share of the people leaving the study area than those either coming or staying. Because most people commuting into the study area are from more eastern counties within Minnesota, this suggests that the study area attracts workers who have fewer options in their rural counties.

The type of work people are traveling to also varies. While the occupants of the study area are nearly equally likely to work in goods-producing industries whether they work close to home or commute, the people coming into the area for work are more likely to work in trade, transportation, and utilities. Because jobs in trade, transportation, and utilities tend to pay less than manufacturing, that may explain why wages for workers coming to the study area generally are lower than wages for people who commute to jobs outside the area.

Younger workers are commuting to the study area to take expanding wholesale trade and transportation and warehousing jobs (see Table 3). These jobs are growing in the study region because of the need to serve the expanding North Dakota market.

Cass County in North Dakota, home of Fargo, was the county Minnesotans are most likely to commute to, pulling in 16,120 workers, or nearly 70 percent of North Dakota-bound commuters from the study area. Grand Forks County attracted 4,553 Minnesotans in 2009, while Richland County, adjacent to the Fargo-Moorhead MSA, pulled in 1,321 Minnesotans. Other Minnesota commuters were scattered across counties that attracted fewer than 300 people each. 

Despite the diverse destinations, most people don’t travel far for work. Of the 43,330 people within the selection area commuting west, southwest, or northwest but not necessarily out of the state, 60.6 percent traveled fewer than 10 miles to work. Another 21.1 percent traveled between 10 and 24 miles to work, meaning that about 80 percent of workers in the area had a reasonable commute of less than 30 minutes.

The labor market along the Minnesota-North Dakota border is a seamless whole, unconcerned with the arbitrary location of political boundaries. Concentrations of jobs and businesses attract and influence people and economic trends, so the cities are the critical elements. Short-term employment trends have attracted the young and mobile to some parts of the state, but the established economy along the border has continued on an even keel.

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