Migration: 700 Millions Want to Move from One Country to Another!

Singaporee comes top followed by Saudi Arabia.

Would you migrate to Saudi Arabia? Maybe Singapore is attractive enough but Saudi Arabia? Ah the note to the table does say only Arabs national and expatriates were surveyed for the Gulf countries. Make sense, maybe!

What does the Potential Net Migration Index (PNMI) tells us?

If all adults who desire to move to another country permanently actually moved to their desired destination country today, some countries would suffer tremendous losses in human capital and others would be overwhelmed. Gallup's Potential Net Migration Index (PNMI) is the estimated number of adults who would like to move out of a country permanently subtracted from the estimated number who would like to move to it, as a proportion of the total population. The higher the resulting positive PNMI value, the larger the potential net populations gain.

Across the countries surveyed, Singapore posts the highest positive PNMI of all countries and areas, with a net migration index value of +260%. This means that Singapore's adult population would increase from an estimated 3.6 million to as high as 13 million. The Democratic of the Congo (Kinshasa) posts the highest negative PNMI, with a net migration index value of -60%, which means its adult population would decrease from an estimated 32 million to as low as 13 million.

If everyone's desire is fulfilled, it means Singaporeans will soon be living on top of each other with little room to move about, in that tiny island state, even more so than now.

But this is not likely to happen as I am sure the borders against migrations will be tightly controlled. Desire to migrate is one thing but ability to migrate is another. So Singapore and Kinshasa is saved from overcrowding and human capital depletion, respectively.Top Desired Countries

The Gallup Migration poll also shows which are the top most desired countries to migrate to. USA is top of the pile followed by Canada. European countries follow closely from the 2 North American countries combined. The top European countries are the UK, France, Spain, and Germany. Australia is also a highly desired country.

Saudi Arabia also came in for a mention, but by the method this poll is conducted, I think it is for Gulf States residents mostly.

The migration pattern tends to be from poor developing countries to developed countries.

For whatever reasons, millions of people desire to emigrate. All in all, if given complete freedom to move, 700 millions will move from one country to another country. That is a massive number by any measure of imagination. But will a borderless world come into reality? I don't think so. This is because of the social and political upheaval that massive migrations will cause.