José Luis Escriva, Spanish Minister for Social Security, Inclusion, and Migration, has claimed the country requires millions of new migrants to combat the forecasted demographic decline in the near future.
According to Mr Escriva, the demographic projections for Spain are so dire that the country will require “eight or nine million people just to keep our working population at the same level”, and noted that other countries should be “prepared to integrate” large migrant populations, France Info reports.
“The demographic trajectories are there. It will happen, we will not escape it,” Escriva said during a meeting of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris on Thursday.
“We must be prepared to integrate into our societies, if we want to maintain our comfort levels, a certain number of additional migrants and our population will be more mixed,” he said and added: “We have to prepare societies for this. Explain to them why it is good for them, for their children, and for generations to come.”
European Commissioner for Migration Ylva Johansson, who also attended the meeting, went on to state that European Union citizens “want to welcome migrants in need of international protection and want to welcome people who will contribute to our economy, but they are worried that we cannot manage migration, that we cannot control it”.
“We must show that we control immigration,” she said and added that the EU could do more to deal with illegal immigrants. Johansson went on to state: “Those who have the right to stay, they are welcome, we must welcome them.”
While many establishment politicians, particularly on the left, have championed mass migration as a way to boost the economies of European countries, economic studies such as a 2016 report from the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) claimed mass migration was harmful to long term economic growth.
A University of Basel study released in 2018 came to the same conclusions, stating that in the short term mass migration can benefit the economy but in the long term migrants are a net loss for the state, rather than a contributor.