The U.S. takes seventh place in best countries to be an immigrant despite hosting the largest number in the world.
Sweden is the best country to be an immigrant in, according to a recent survey by U.S. News. Finland takes ninth place, with Norway and Denmark also present in the top ten.
Respondents of the survey ranked eighty countries according to subjective perceptions of economic stability, quality of the job market, income equality, and whether the country is one in which the respondent could imagine living in. Moreover, the percentage of immigrants in a country’s population, the amount of remittances sent home, and an assessment by the United Nations of integration measures provided for immigrants were included in the methodology.
The data on global perceptions of various countries were gathered through survey responses from more than 21,000 business leaders, intellectuals and general citizens.
Nordic countries are ranked so high primarily because of favourable ratings on economic stability and income equality. However, some Nordic countries, notably Finland, fall in rankings because of the low percentage of immigrants in the overall population. According to the latest data by OECD, immigrants make up 16 per cent of Sweden’s overall population, while the equivalent number lies at no more than 5.6 per cent in Finland. This explains why Finland ranks nine places behind Sweden in best countries to be an immigrant in.
Surprisingly, the United Kingdom, despite hosting the sixth largest number of immigrants in the world, ranks at seventeenth place. According to U.S. News, this is because the UK currently employs immigration policies that are purely concerned with the interests of nationals, as opposed to those of immigrants.
The United States, on the other hand, hosts the largest number of immigrants in the world – that is 46.6 million – and takes seventh place in the survey. The primary reason the U.S. failed to climb to the very first places in the ranking was a low score in perceived income equality.
In terms of the share of immigrants in a country’s population, the United Arab Emirates hosts, by far, most immigrants, with almost 90 per cent of the population having migrated from abroad. Nevertheless, the country falls at 15th place due to a lack of integration policies.
