Pablo Hiriart
Madrid.- Two figures reflect a heated reality: the immigrant population in Spain is growing at a rate of 600,000 people per year, and immigrants occupy 90% of all jobs created in the last five quarters. There have already been isolated outbreaks of violence, and 73.4% of Spaniards (according to a SocioMétrica survey) say that the number of immigrants is excessive.
These figures led me to knock on the door of the Elcano Royal Institute, where I was received by Dr. Carmen González Enríquez, director of the Public Opinion and Migration department of the prestigious Spanish think tank.
-Doctor, have 90% of new jobs been filled by immigrants? Is that correct?
Carmen González Enríquez: The figure of 90% is correct for the four quarters of 2024 and the first quarter of 2025. It comes from the Active Population Survey (EPA). That information is accurate. Yes.
– How has the immigrant population grown?
– Since we recovered from the economic consequences of the pandemic, we have seen 600,000, 700,000, and 500,000 people arriving in Spain, depending on the year, but the average is 600,000 new people. This is the net growth, because many more come and many leave. So, the net increase is that.
– Why Spain?
Carmen González Enríquez explains several reasons and highlights two: “The causes of immigration to Spain are not only work-related, the possibility of finding work here and having a higher income than in their country, but also the possibility of free, quality public education, which many countries do not have. An extensive healthcare system, universally accessible and free of charge. This is something that practically no country from which most immigrants to Spain come offers its citizens.
-Do you perceive that the welfare state is at risk due to the arrival of migrants?
-There has not been investment in welfare services, health, or education, but also in other areas, commensurate with population growth. In other words, between 2000 and 2024, the population in Spain has grown by 23%. That is nine million people. This is the highest growth rate in the European Union. It is double the average for EU countries. And the public budget allocated to what we might call the welfare state has not grown at the same rate.
-In 24 years, it has increased by 23%, even though fewer and fewer Spaniards are being born…?
-Fewer and fewer Spaniards are being born, that’s true, and this is partly offset by the births of immigrant children, but not entirely. The decline in the birth rate among native women has been sharp in recent years, which is due to many other factors: access to housing, job insecurity among young people, and the type of wages paid. In Spain, wages have not risen in recent years in terms of purchasing power.
-So what is the outlook?
-The situation now for young people who want to have children, for example, is very, very difficult. And that creates enormous frustration. They can’t leave home. Spain is one of the European countries where young people go home the latest: the average age is around 30. And one thing is related to the other: if we hadn’t had that massive influx of new population, these young people would have had to be better paid. They would have received higher wages because labor is a commodity like any other.
-What bothers Europeans in general about immigrants?-There are several things. There is an aspect related, once again, to security. Countries where immigration is primarily Muslim have suffered terrorist attacks. In France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark, ghettos are forming, where the Muslim population is creating parallel societies.
The senior researcher at the Elcano Royal Institute adds:
“We are also seeing in some countries a failure of the next generations (the children of immigrants) to integrate well into the labor market. We see a frustration of their expectations, because the next generations do not have the same expectations as their parents. The first generations compare their well-being with that of their country of origin and, in that comparison, they take stock of their lives and say: ‘Well, we’ve come out ahead, it’s good that we came from Turkey to Germany’. But perhaps their children, already born in Germany, no longer see Turkey as their country of reference; their reference point is people of their own age who were born in Germany. And statistics show that they have more difficulty than native Germans in obtaining good grades in the education system and, therefore, in accessing the best training and then the best jobs. So this is the serious problem that Europe is experiencing in many countries.
He explains that “Sweden is famous because, for decades and decades, immigration came to them through asylum. So, apparently, it was a very generous country because it was one of the countries that granted the most asylum. What Sweden was doing, apart from looking good to the world, especially to the Third World, was integrating these people into the labor market. What happened to their children afterwards? Well, a much higher number than the average for native Swedes are living off the welfare state. In other words, they don’t have jobs and still need help from the state for housing, survival, and food.“
Then, he adds, ”when this is very small, nothing happens. But when it reaches a certain size, the local population gets angry. They become annoyed, and this is the basis for the adverse reactions. Does the far right also manipulate this, the xenophobic parties? Yes, it is, but it has a basis: they don’t make it up entirely and send out messages that resonate with people’s everyday experiences. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be successful.
-But with the declining population, you need immigration to sustain your pension system, for example…
-Most of them, when they arrive in Europe, find that they don’t know the language. Many are illiterate in their mother tongue, especially women. This makes it quite challenging to train them to the point where they can integrate into a very competitive labor market. It is becoming increasingly complex to find a good job.
-And what happens?
-Many of them do find jobs where they are paid a pittance or very little. What social security contributions do these low-paid jobs make? How can the pension system be sustained? They are paid less than what retirees retiring this year are receiving.
-So, Doctor?
-The numbers don’t add up. Europe needs immigration, and it needs young people. Still, it needs people who can take on high-productivity jobs, because they are the only ones who can pay good wages and, therefore, the only ones who can make high social security contributions. In other words, a vast abundance of low-paid jobs does not solve the problem of pensions for the European population.
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