"Where Is Everyone Going?" Presenting Goldman's Immigration Flow Chart

 people flows (i.e. immigration and migration) are grabbing international headlines these days thanks in large part to i) the massive influx of asylum seekers entering Western Europe from war-torn Syria, and ii) GOP frontrunner Donald Trump’s outspoken position on illegal immigration in the US. These two issues are part of a larger discussion about how demographics affect societal and economic outcomes or, as we put it yesterday, “demographic shifts, whether gradual or sudden, whether wholly domestic or emanating from some exogenous shock (like say a horrible US foreign policy outcome) matter - and they matter a lot.”  

Regardless of one’s position on immigration in the US or the EU’s response to the worsening migrant flow from the Mid-East, understanding “where everyone is going” (so to speak) may be more critical now than at any time in recent history. 

With that, we present the following flowchart from Goldman which shows, in analyst Hugo Scott-Gall’s words, “net people outflow and inflow countries (in grey and blue respectively), with major people flows highlighted. Size of the box depicts size of net inflows/outflows; note that line colours are only meant to make flows easier to follow.”