Whether you call yourself an immigrant seeking to establish a new permanent life in a country or an expat temporarily living away from home or you cannot make up your mind, there are lots of us around the globe as the article "Migration strains rich and poor" from the BBC shows.
The UK leads the pack amongst OECD countries with no less than 3.2 million citizens living abroad, a good number having headed to warmer retirement in Spain. Australia is a popular destination too (and I hear about it a lot here in Scotland), perhaps partly accounting for its world leading 22% of the population which is foreign born. The UK is an immigration magnet as well, with some 8% of the population foreign-born ... though I'm not sure how recent or accurate those numbers might be since that would put the absolute number around 5 million (8% x 61 million) and there has been a huge influx of folks from new EU countries, especially Poland, which one estimate says has 1.5 million citizens in the UK.
Canada, as usual, cannot decide whether it is coming or going. It has a large number of expats - around 1 million (of which I would guess the vast majority are in the USA) - combined with a high proportion of the population (looks like 18-19% on the BBC graph) being immigrants. The 1 million Canadian expats represents about 3% of the population. It is astounding that expat Canadians outnumber US expats, since the US has a population about 10 times that of Canada - 300 million vs 33 million as of 2007.
Thursday 21 February 2008
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6 comments:
300 million is around 10 times 33 million (9 really, but I won't get too detailed), not 20 times.
Also, it could be that our country is a winter desert wasteland most of the year . . . it may have something to do with the million people that just want out.
Hmm, 20 times, 10 times ... it must be that newfie calculator I installed on my computer or something.
Found some good newfie jokes here.
Newfie Jokes
The Canadian Expat Association quotes the Asia Pacific Foundation statistic that there are 2.7 million Canadian Expats around the globe. As a member of the association and an Expat I can attest that there are close to 200,000 in Hong Kong alone.
Asia Pacific Foundation Document
Canadian Expat Association
I'm not sure what the exact numbers are in the US. However, I think you are right. There are a lot of us out here.
Thanks Christopher for the link. Had not seen that website before. Will be checking it ou in detail. I have several more expat-oriented postings in development on various money subjects.
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