Preliminary version: Please do not quote Version 2.08 Migration between the Nordic countries - A Knowledge flow perspective By Ebbe K. Graversen*) *) The Danish Institute for Studies in Research and Research Policy Finlandsgade 4 DK – 8200 Aarhus N. Denmark October 2000 Preliminary version to be presented at the 3rd ordinary meeting in the Nordic Group for Mobility Studies in Århus, 9-11th November 2000 Acknowledgements: Financial support from the Nordic Industrial Fund as well as the Danish Institute for Studies in Research and Research Policy are gratefully acknowledged. Mette Lemming has performed valuable research assistance in the project. 1. Introduction Mobility of persons across national borders have for long been a high priority research area. A long discussion of the net value of migration has dominated the agenda. Theoretically, there is no clear conclusion on the optimal migration. However, several studies have tried empirically to validate or calculate the effects. The aim of this study is to amend to the latter part and increase the knowledge of the people migrating between the Nordic countries. Through a comparison of the register data available in all the countries a more detailed picture can be drawn of the migration. Hence, an account of the brain drain, brain gain and brain circulation can be fulfilled. Usually, register data can give a full and detailed description of the emigrants with a national citizenship when they leave the country. However, the emigrants with other citizenships have usually not a full track in the registers if they for example immigrated to the country only a few years earlier. In such a case, the registers would only contain information on these few years and not items as for example educational levels, skills, and work careers previous to the immigration. In general the registers will not contain this information for immigrants. However, for national citizens returning to the country, the information at the emigration time is available. This information might be outdated but this is not possible to detect in the registers. A use of register data from all the Nordic countries can give aggregated answers to the non-available information mentioned above. The registers can give information on the persons that leaves the country and what they have been doing when present in the registers. Combining the information from the register data in two countries, information on the knowledge stock and previous career for immigrants from the other country as well as the added knowledge stock and career track for the persons returning or emigrating to the other country. Especially, the combination of information from register data in two countries can determine the added knowledge obtained by returning persons, i.e. the brain gain of return migration and the increase in the knowledge stock obtained from brain circulation. 2. Definition of migration in the Nordic countries The Nordic countries have different rules for registration of migration. Basically, a movement from one country to another is required. However, the period of intended stay in another country before a migration is recorded in the statistical registers differs between the countries, see Table 1. 2 Table 1: Definitions of de facto stay before migration count in the Nordic counties. National rules and the UN recommendation Country Time of intended stay before registration as migrant Denmark 3 month until 1991, 6 month after 1991 Norway 6 month Sweden 12 month Finland 12 month Iceland 12 month UN recommendation 12 month Note: Since 1991, the intended stay has to be at least 6 months before migration between the Nordic (and only these) countries counts in the national migration registers, cf. Grundström (1993). Source: Grundström (1993). These differences in the definition of migration will result in a relatively higher numbers of migrations in Denmark and Norway compared to the other Nordic countries. However, Grundström (1993) suggests adjusting the migration figures to individuals who actually stays more than 12 months in the “new” country. Using register data from 1989, he makes the migration figures comparable between the Nordic countries and finds that the Danish figures overestimate the 12- month figures for migration by approximately 40%. The similar bias is close to 10% for the other Nordic countries. Looking at the net migration, the Danish net migration is 30% to high, the Norwegian 60% to high, the Finnish 15% to high and the Swedish 7% to high. In order to secure comparable statistics on migration, the migration measure need to be defined as a 12 month of de facto stay in the country. No matter whether the period of interest covers time before and after 1991, 12 month of de facto stay is the best statistical measure to use1. The same measure can also be used for migration statistics between the Nordic countries and the rest of the world in order to extend the present analysis with comparable studies. The fact that the register data in the Nordic countries are annually also supports the use of a 12-month rule. Similarly, most countries report migration figures annually. Hence, all figures based on register data and reported in the present analyses are based on year-to-year comparisons. Migration requires that the person leaves or comes into the population from one year to the next. Immigration: A person entering a country is immigrating to the receiving country, i.e. the immigration country. Emigration: A person leaving a country is emigrating from the delivering country, i.e. the emigration country. 1 Grundström (1993) refers, that the UN recommends the following definitions of immigration: Long-term immigrants: more than 12 months. Short-term immigrants: less or equal 12 months. 3 3. Aggregated migration figures from Nordic Statistical Yearbook The total number of persons moving between the Nordic countries is given in the Nordic Statistical Yearbook. Table 2 gives the figures for selected years in the 1990s. A large fraction of the persons moving comes back a few years later, i.e. return migration, cf. Pedersen (1996). Table 2: Registered number of migrants between the Nordic countries over time. Percent share of total country specific migration in parentheses Receiving Immigration year country 1990 1992 1993 1995 1996 1997 1998 12182 10441 10658 12245 12041 11504 11351 Denmark (30) (24) (25) (19) (22) (23) (22) 2398 . 2047 2182 2378 2518 2349 Greenland (96) (.) (95) (96) (96) (96) (96) 6571 3723 3300 3895 4286 4041 4523 Finland (48) (26) (22) (32) (32) (30) (32) 1958 1893 1680 1769 2261 2396 2616 Iceland (61) (63) (62) (61) (61) (60) (57) 8028 7497 7713 7850 8635 11774 . Norway (31) (28) (24) (31) (33) (37) (.) 18094 7998 7150 8760 8082 8113 9854 Sweden (30) (18) (12) (19) (20) (18) (20) All Nordic 51221 31552 34541 38696 39679 42343 32691 countries (35) (24) (22) (25) (28) (29) (27) Delivering Emigration year country 1990 1992 1993 1995 1996 1997 1998 10287 7900 7613 9122 9735 9707 10808 Denmark (32) (25) (24) (26) (26) (25) (27) 3687 . 2585 2663 2853 2943 2907 Greenland (99) (.) (99) (99) (99) (99) (99) 4464 3491 3424 4041 4010 4575 5150 Finland (69) (58) (54) (45) (38) (47) (48) 2688 1621 1808 3185 3079 2731 2637 Iceland (70) (51) (62) (74) (75) (70) (72) 11221 5394 4876 6362 6210 6750 . Norway (47) (32) (26) (33) (30) 32) (.) 15255 11738 10975 11020 12074 13965 14242 Sweden (61) (46) (37) (32) (36) (36) (37) All Nordic 49592 30144 33274 38388 39957 42668 37742 countries (52) (36) (36) (37) (37) (37) (39) Note: Includes all persons moving independent of age. Source: Nordic Statistical Yearbook, 1999. The difference between the total number of immigrants and emigrant between the Nordic countries in Table 2 also shows that some of the persons are missing either in the immigration account or in 4 the emigration account. Theoretically, the total should be equal but in practice difference up to 1,500 persons per year is found in Table 2. There also seems to be some correlation between the migration numbers and the national business cycle measured by for example the unemployment rate. The citizenship of the immigrants and emigrants are interesting. Nordic Statistical Yearbook 1999 shows that more than 50% of all emigrants have national citizenships. When and whether they return and what they do when they are abroad is the key element in the present analyses. Nordic Statistical Yearbook 1999 illustrates the distribution of the immigrants and emigrants by country for 1998. The figures are referred in Table 3. Table 3: Immigration and emigration between the Nordic countries by country in 1998 (Column percent in parentheses) Delivering Immigration country (measured by receiving country) country Denmark Greenland Finland Iceland Norway Sweden 4272 2183 342 1418 2782 1927 Denmark (38) (93) (8) (54) (24) (20) 416 4 . 58 1012 3288 Finland (4) (0) (.) (2) (9) (33) 1241 89 50 . 782 346 Iceland (11) (4) (1) (. (7) (4) 2852 45 613 554 . 4293 Norway (25) (2) (14) (21) (.) (44) 2570 28 3518 586 7198 . Sweden (23) (1) (78) (22) (61) (.) All Nordic 11351 2349 4523 2616 11774 9854 countries (100) (100) (100) (100) (100) (100) Receiving Emigration country (measured by delivering country) country Denmark Greenland Finland Iceland Norway Sweden 3907 2813 395 1301 2932 2445 Denmark (36) (97) (8) (49) (43) (17) 377 31 . 57 353 3472 Finland (3) (1) (.) (2) (5) (24) 1359 60 53 . 408 560 Iceland (13) (2) (1) (.) (6) (4) 3117 18 1366 927 . 7765 Norway (29) (1) (27) (35) (.) (55) 2048 13 3336 352 3057 . Sweden (19) (0) (65) (13) (45) (.) All Nordic 10808 2907 5150 2637 6750 14242 countries (100) (100) (100) (100) (100) (100) Note: Includes all persons moving independent of age. Norway: 1997. Source: Nordic Statistical Yearbook, 1999 5 The share of Danes immigrating from Denmark to Denmark and emigrating similarly, illustrates the differences in definitions of migration, e.g.