Saturday, April 20, 2013

Ironic Migration: Invisible Inflows

Ironic migration is unexpected because the flows are hard to see or difficult to measure. When we get wind of the new narrative, we are noticing something that has been around for awhile. The undetected in Poland:

Official statistics show about 7,000 EU citizens moving to Poland in a given year, but the data are not very sound because migrants are not required to register with Polish authorities, said Krystyna Iglicka, a demographer with Warsaw’s Centre for International Relations, a think-tank.

This is an invisible flow based on anecdotal evidence, but there is no doubt that such a flow exists,” she said. “We can assume that the trend will strengthen, although of course it does not compare in size to the outflow of Poles.”

Emphasis added. These invisible flows, reverse migrations, are the hallmarks of the diverging Talent Economy. Still a major exporter of workers, Poland is the place to be. That's ironic.

Each main current of migration produces a compensating counter-current. - Ernest George Ravenstein: The Laws of Migration, 1885

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