Where have European workers and retirees been moving to? A look back at what happened in 2015.
The 2016 annual report on intra-EU mobility, published by the European Commission, presents mobility data and trends across Europe over 2015. Find out below more on Europeans preferred destinations, countries of origins, retirement trends, and more.
In 2015 about 11.3mnl working age and 8.5mln active citizens were on the move across the EU-28 (about 3.6% of the total active population)
Where from:
- Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal and Romania represent more than half of all movers in EU.
Where to:
- Main destinations remain unchanged: Germany (2.7mln), UK (2.1mln), Spain (1.4 mln), Italy, France and Switzerland (about 1mln each).
- While countries with highest inflows relative to the local population are: Luxembourg, Switzerland, Cyprus, Ireland and Belgium.
- Since 2009, Germany and Austria have seen the largest increase in inflows (+219% and +86% respectively), followed by Finland (+60%), UK (+57%) and Denmark (+54%).
- Germany and Austria attract an increasing number of workers from both South and Eastern Europe, whereas the inflow from southern Europe to UK has been declining since 2014.
Return:
- Return mobility to the EU-13 countries (13 countries that entered the EU in 2004: Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia) as well as Italy and Spain has been increasing.
- Reasons behind range from the introduction of restrictions to access the labour market to evolving economy in host / home countries. At individual level, both work-related factors as well as social and family issues can lead to the decision to return.
- Most of the returnees in 2015 were young (20 to 34 years old).
Retiring in a different country:
- There were about 1.4mln retired EU-28 movers.
- Countries with the largest share of mobile retirees are in order: France and Germany, UK, Spain, Switzerland and Belgium. In most of those countries mobile retirees have been working there and stayed after retirement.
- Differently, countries such as Cyprus, Malta, Portugal and Spain attract retire es who had never previously worked there.
- Mobile retirees arrive mainly from Germany and UK. They prefer different destinations with UK citizens concentrating in Cyprus, France and Spain, and German retirees rather heading towards Croatia and Greece.
- In 2015 states received cross-border reimbursement for health care for over 370,000 retirees.
- Most of mobile retirees choose to stay in the last country where they resided and worked, with only a small percentage returning to their country of origin.
Findings from: 2016 Annual Report on intra-EU Labour Mobility Final Report December 2016, Elena Fries-Tersch, Tugce Tugran and Harriet Bradley - European Commission