Migration is a complex and multi-dimensional phenomenon that always has been of interest to many researchers in various sciences. In this study, the migration issue from an economic standpoint has been studied. The main purpose of the present study is to investigate the relationship between unemployment and net migration. To this aim, using the data of all cities in Iran during the period of 2007-2017, the relationship between the two aforementioned variables has been examined via a spatial causality approach, and afterwards the migration model has been estimated through the spatial econometric method. The obtained results confirm the existence of causality between net migration and unemployment so that the direction of this causality is from unemployment to net migration. Moreover, the derived results from the estimation of migration model using spatially lagged explanatory variables model (SLX), specify that unemployment rate, industrial employment share, GDP per capita, the young population share of total population, and education play the most crucial role in the net migration model, also these variables have significant direct and spillover effects on net migration. It is noteworthy that unemployment, as the key variable of this study, has a negative direct effect and a positive spatial spillover effect on net migration. In other words, however rising unemployment in a city can decrease the net migration in that city, the net migration in the nearby cities will be increased.