The Economic Consequences of Students Inflow for Local Enterprises

The aim of the article is to present the mechanism via which educational migration related to undertaking higher education can influence on local good and service market, labour market and entrepreneurship.Design/methodology/approach: The economic consequences of student inflow have been shown for one of the academic cities in Poland – Opole which has one of the highest student-to-inhabitant ratios and approx. 90% of students are internal educational migrants. The analysis has been based on the results of empirical research conducted among educational migrants of all universities in Opole selected based on quota sampling. The complementary to the presented data were the correlation analysis and the result of the research conducted in 2016 among the local enterprises which concern their opinion about the impact of incoming students on their companies. Findings: The results and estimates presented in this study shows that educational migrations related to tertiary education may create substantial economic benefits for the academic city. This study paid particular attention to benefits for local market of goods and services, the local labour and thanks that mechanism on local enterprises in an academic city.Research/practical implications: The results of the research and the estimates can be used by local authorities of academic city for awareness of the importance of students’ inflow for local economy. The diagnosis can be used in design scenarios for improving the demographic and economic situation of the academic city. Originality/value: The impact of the inflow of student of local economy of academic city, especially their economic consequences for the area of the internal inflow are a research problem almost absent in the scientific discourse