Many are migrating to find the next job

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CHICAGO, Jan. 18 (UPI) -- Making a career move may take U.S. workers far beyond their local job markets, a CareerBuilder survey found.

In a survey of 3,000 employers and 7,000 workers that explored the concept of relocating, CareerBuilder said 20 percent of the respondents who were laid off and found new jobs in the past 12 months indicated they had moved to a new city or state.

At the same time, 32 percent of employers indicated they would be willing to pay a worker to relocate, CareerBuilder said.

Nineteen percent of employers indicated they would be open to paying a smaller salary to a worker in the first year in order to give a signing bonus to the new employee.

That only works if an employee is willing to relocate. The survey also found that 44 percent of the employees indicated they would be willing to relocate to find a new job.

"One of the key trends we saw coming out of the recession is the movement of labor in and out of markets across the U.S.," said Matt Ferguson, chief executive officer of CareerBuilder in a statement.

"Workers have had to expand their job search geographically and employers in need of hard-to-find, skilled talent have had to recruit across state lines," Ferguson said.

CareerBuilder has launched a new online service, CareerRelocate.com, to accommodate workers willing to relocate, the firm said.

Of those who relocated, 30 percent indicated they had made a fresh start, while 31 percent indicated they had benefited by meeting new friends. Twenty-nine percent indicated they had enjoyed new experiences, while 27 percent indicated their new salaries gave their families more spending power.

On the negative side, workers who relocated indicated higher costs of living, stress on the family and feeling homesick were sometimes part of the bargain.

The survey was taken Nov. 9 to Dec. 5 and carries a margin of error of plus and minus 1.78 percent.