Immigration, Caritas-Migrantes report: 2 million foreigners have been vaccinated. Muslims are falling but unemployment is on the rise
The number of people living outside their country of origin reached the record figure of 280.6 million in 2020 (+8.4 million compared to the previous year) or 3.6% of the world population. This was recorded in the XXX Caritas-Migrantes Report presented today in Rome. In detail, the majority of international migrants come from middle-income countries, while only 13% from low-income countries, even if the share of these has increased significantly in the last 20 years in conjunction with the growth of the humanitarian crises that have affected many areas of the planet.
On a continental level, Europe continues to be the area most affected by human mobility, with nearly 87 million migrants, many of whom are European citizens who have moved within the Schengen area. North America hosts the second largest number of migrants, totaling nearly 59 million people; North Africa and the Middle East follow, with nearly 50 million. In the last 20 years, the most sustained growth has been recorded not only in Europe, with 30 million more migrants, but also in North Africa and the Middle East, which together have seen an increase in the migrant population of about 29 million people. . The significant increase in migrants in the North African and Middle Eastern region was determined by an important influx of refugees and asylum seekers who in these two regions, from 2000 to 2020, exceeded 9 million people, mainly due to the Syrian conflict.
As for the countries with the highest number of foreign nationals, the United States of America is confirmed as the main destination for international migrants, with 51 million migrants in 2020, equal to 18% of the world total. Germany follows with around 16 million, Saudi Arabia with 13 million, the Russian Federation with 12 million and the United Kingdom with 9 million. Of the top 20 destinations, 17 are represented by high or medium-high income countries and, of these, most are located in Europe. With reference to the countries of origin, India remains at the top of the ranking: in 2020 as many as 18 million Indians lived outside the country. Other important diasporas are the Mexican and Russian ones, with 11 million emigrants each. Followed by the Chinese (10 million) and Syrian (8 million).
Regarding the origin of forced migrants, the data referring to 2020 highlight a very polarized reality in two areas of the planet: the Middle East and South America. One fifth of the displaced people registered globally come from Syria (6.7 million) while in one case out of six from Palestine (5.7 million). Venezuela has the third largest number of internationally displaced people in the world, with over 4 million refugees overseas.
Immigration, Caritas-Migrantes report: “Foreigners penalized for receiving support from the state”
Foreign citizens are penalized in benefiting from citizenship income and also in accessing and using government bonuses. The Caritas 2021 Report recalls that to “deal with the epidemiological emergency”, the “August Decree” and the “Refreshments Decree” were introduced for the whole year with the “Cura Italia Decree” and subsequently extended with the “Relaunch Decree”. 2020 extraordinary measures to support companies in the field of ordinary wage supplement treatment, ordinary allowance for solidarity funds, exemption from layoffs. Bonuses have also been introduced for specific categories of workers and support for families (leave and bonuses). babysitter) “.
Well, the average incidence of non-EU citizens on these measures stands at 9-10%, with the exception of the autonomous bonus, parental leave and the babysitter bonus, in which it stops at 3-4%, confirming the general difficulties in accessing the submission of the application by the person entitled and the lack of attractiveness of measures that can be difficult to sustain in the case of already low wages (such as parental leave).
As already noted in the last Report, even the measure currently in force to support people in poverty, the “Citizenship Income”, has enormous limits linked to the coverage of foreigners, since one of the access requirements provides for residence in Italy for 10 years, the last two of which continuously. “Foreign citizens already in the pre-pandemic situation suffered a double disadvantage: the permanence in conditions of poverty and insufficient protection through the ordinary measure of income support for people in economic difficulty. Given this starting situation, – notes the Report – the eruption of the pandemic has made it urgent to provide for interventions that compensate for the shortcomings of coverage of the measures in force. , which have done nothing but compromise the ability to reach the foreign population “.
Immigration, Caritas-Migrantes report: “Unemployment increases among foreigners, women the most affected”
The Caritas-Migrantes Report 2021 also analyzes the impact of the pandemic on the working conditions of foreign citizens and records the fact that the “employment condition of foreign workers already present in Italy has suffered a strong backlash due to the pandemic, both for the closure of many work activities in sectors with an important incidence of foreign citizens both for the continuation of others, essential for the satisfaction of primary needs, and to be carried out necessarily in the presence, which have in any case exposed foreign citizens to the risk of labor exploitation or of Covid-19 infection.
To this is added the higher probability of foreign citizens to hold more precarious types of contracts and therefore more linked to the risk of non-renewal of the contract. “In detail, the unemployment rate of foreign citizens (13.1%) is higher than that of Italian citizens (8.7%), while the employment rate of foreigners (60.6%) fell more intensely, so much so that it was lower than that of natives (62.8%). Immigrant women suffered from the crisis much more than their male counterparts, with a reduction in the employment rate twice as high. Most affected are those employed in hotels and restaurants (25.2% of the EU and 21.5% of the non-EU) and other collective services and personal (27.6% of the EU and 25.2% of the non-EU).
There is also a significant share of workers, which in 2020 exceeded 2 million people (+ 10.9% from 2019), who are uncertain about their future to the point that they believe they can lose their jobs. The analysis of the phenomenon also took into account the level of education. Thus, while for Italians the fear of running into an unfortunate event decreases in parallel with the increase in the level of education – confirming that the possession of higher skills provides greater security in the face of the occurrence of risks – this does not happen among non-EU foreigners. . The share of non-EU graduated workers who have fears about their professional status (15.0%) is even higher not only than high school graduates (13.1%), but also than those with at most a middle school certificate (14.7%) ). In this case, the qualification does not constitute a guarantee of employment stability, probably due to the fact that even those with high skills carry out low-specialized tasks.