Scientific Underpinnings of - START - National Consortium for the ...

2. Independent Trend and Trajectory of the Future: Issues Impacting
Social Regional Stability
2.1. Demographics
2.1.A. Demographic and Economic Trends: Implications for International
Migration (Philip Martin)
Author and Organization: Dr. Philip Martin, Professor, University of California Davis, UC
Comparative Immigration & Integration Program
Contact Information: martin@primal.ucdavis.edu
Abstract
About three percent of the world’s 6.1 billion people were international migrants in 2000.
Population growth is expected to slow between 2000 and 2050 in comparison to 1950–2000, but
international migration is expected to rise as persisting demographic and economic inequalities
that motivate migration interact with revolutions in communications and transportation that
enable people to cross borders. The default policy option to manage what is sometimes deemed
out-of-control migration, adjusting the rights of migrants, is unsatisfactory, prompting this
review of longer term factors affecting migration patterns, including aging in industrial countries,
rural-urban migration that spills over national borders, and the migration infrastructure of agents
and networks that moves people. The paper concludes with an assessment of the likely effects of
the 2008–09 recession on international migration.
Introduction
This paper outlines the major demographic and economic trends likely to affect international
migration flows through 2050, with special emphasis on the effects of three factors—population
aging, rural-urban movements, and the inequalities that encourage workers to move from lower
to higher wage countries. The paper also reviews the “migration infrastructure,” the institutions
and actors ranging from recruiters, transportation firms, and those who benefit economically
from employing and integrating migrants. Finally, the paper reviews the likely effects of the
current recession on migration flows.
The half century between 1950 and 2000 was a period of extraordinarily fast population growth
and urbanization—the global population rose by 1.5 times, the populations of many countries
doubled, tripled, and quadrupled, and the urban share of world’s population rose from 29 to 48
percent. 1 Population growth is expected to slow, with the world’s fertility falling below the
replacement level of 2.1 in 2025 as urbanization continues. Unlike the past 50 years, when
almost all countries had baby booms and falling mortality, the hallmark of the next half century
is expected to be unevenness in demographic change. Almost all of the world’s approximately
200 countries are projected to have aging populations, while a quarter of the countries are
expected to have shrinking populations, and another quarter of the countries are expected to
continue growing at rates that will double their populations within 50 years.
The world’s labor force is drawn from people 15 years of age and older. The major trends of the
past 50 years have been the increasing share of married women with children who work for
wages, later labor force entry due to less child labor and more education, and earlier retirement
associated with better pensions. Over the next 50 years, these trends are expected to persist,
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