East Macedonia and Thrace attracts EU movers with higher education than the domestic workforce

The battle for talent within the EU is a story about both brain drain and gain. Of the 17 million people aged 15–64 migrating within the EU¹, around 4.5 million are highly skilled workers and students. Factors known for attracting these people from their home regions are economic growth, higher wages, robust social security, linguistic and cultural similarity, relatively easier access to the labour market and higher employment rates.²

In contrast, the brain drain phenomenon arises when a region can not compete and suffers a permanent loss of skilled workers or students.

East Macedonia and Thrace is a “receiving” region, with more people moving in than out. In 2017 the net migration rate was 2.4 persons per 1,000 inhabitants.

A positive net migration means that more people are moving in, than out. A negative value means that the region is losing population. Net migration includes, in this case, both domestic and international movement.

Receiving regions generally have considerably higher GDP per capita, whilst sending regions come off below the EU average.³

Sending regions appear to be located in most of Portugal and Greece, in Spain, the north-eastern parts of France, the northern parts of Finland, the Baltic States and in several parts of Eastern Europe.

Receiving regions are generally found in northern areas of the EU, e.g Sweden, Ireland, Estonia, Denmark and the UK.

The battle for the brains

The nature of the migration flows differs considerably across Europe. Some regions attract and gain highly educated workers, while others lose them. In this section we look closer at the education level of the newcomers, compared to the domestic population. Do the migrants⁴ affect the supply of skilled labour?

These are some of the key findings for East Macedonia and Thrace:

• Europeans that have moved to East Macedonia and Thrace generally have a higher education level than workers born in Greece (28 percent of EU movers had higher education, compared to 22 percent in the workforce as a whole).
• This level makes East Macedonia and Thrace an unfavoured recipient of highly educated migrants compared to other European regions. ⁵
• In the past ten years the education level among EU migrants in East Macedonia and Thrace has fallen slightly (-6 percent points).
• In the same time the education level among the whole workforce in East Macedonia and Thrace has increased (+6 percent points).

What about the future? Reports on the modern knowledge economy say that high skilled immigration will continue to boost economic growth in the attractive regions. Income differentials combined with differences in living standards between regions will remain the primary driver of economic migration. The demand for skilled labour is robust. By 2025 nearly half of all new expected job openings in the EU is expected to target highly qualified workers⁶.