MIGRATION FROM CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPE TO THE UK

The inflow of people into a country has a significant impact on the country it’s in. Most economic sectors, such as manufacturing, agriculture, and, most significantly, the labor market, are affected. In 2004, for example, there were approximately 2% of immigrants in the UK job market due to free migration to the UK (Lemos and Portes 2008, p.2). Immigration also brings in social and cultural transitions and restrictions. In most cases, increased pressure is placed on an already overcrowded world, resulting in a fight for limited resources.
The influx of people to the UK also has raised some concerns about the quality of labor the immigrants brought to the UK economy. This saw other countries of the Western Europe resist from giving free access to the immigrants as UK, Ireland, and Sweden did (Longhi and Rokicka 2012, p.1). Also apart from raising the level of unemployment, there is an increased concern about the changes in wages since most of the immigrants are known to offer cheap labor. However, immigration is sometimes a source of innovation and generation of new ideas that might be of greater benefit to the host country.

Objective of the Study

This paper will focus on the major economic, cultural and social impacts of the immigrants to the UK. The paper also will in detail analyze the status of UK economy before the 2004 enlargement and after the enlargement. On the economic sector, the paper will stress on the labor market from both the immigrants and the host population.

Literature Review

Migrations of workers to the UK seem to have opened a platform for economic gain through increased tax payers. In the period between 2006 and 2007, UK recorded 713000 new Nationals in the job market. They participated in paying taxes and increased the workforce which is an important move in economic development (Marangozov 2008). According to Marangozov (2008), UK recorded the highest number of immigrants in the year 2005. She also argues that the economic gain from the 2004 enlargement were short-term as some people from the central and eastern Europe were on temporal employment.

According to Lemos and Portes (2008), UK experienced an increase of about 2% of the labour force by the immigrants. This was after the grant of the free of movement of workers to accession nationals. This increase had an impact in the on the labour market and more importantly it is associated with the rise of job seekers and overall unemployment (Lemos and Portes 2008, p.2). Consequently, the inflow has been criticized for depressed wages in UK’s economy. Lemos and Portes (2008) argue that the rate of unemployment increased in the period between 2004 to 2006 this can be attributed to increased numbers of immigrants in the UK (Lemos and Portes 2008, p.6). Also before the free movement grant especially in early 2004, the employment level was high to significant levels.

However, the evidence is little on the economic blow brought about by the immigrants.according to the center for economic performance, areas with the highest number of the immigrants did show drastic fall in employment and wages since the year 2008 (Tetlow 2016). According to Tetlow (2016) little evidence exists on the negative impact of immigrants on jobs and wages. He argues that immigrants bring on board useful skills that complement those of the native workforce. Tetlow’s report recognizes the need for the government to bridge the notion that there are negative impacts on the wages and jobs in by migrants. Therefore the government opts to address the issue by making the overall benefit of the immigrants be felt by the affected parties (Tetlow 2016 ).

The fact that the increased population raises unemployment level does not necessarily mean a blow to the UK’s economy. Most of the immigrants are young and innovative which according to economists they are more economically active (Smith 2013). The migrants tend to be more educated as compared to the UK-born population. This implies that there is a likelihood of them securing jobs more than the UK-born population. According to Smith (2013), immigrants contribute intensively to the by paying taxes and spending in the host country with limited social benefits claimed.

Methodology

To provide solutions to the research question or rather to give a clear response to the objectives of the study, I have opted to use the embedded design. Embedded design is a mixed methodology that with two sets of data in which one set provides supportive evidence to the primary data set (Creswell 2006, p.67 ). For instance outlining quantitative results without backing them up with a qualitatively analyzed data might not display clear guide in answering the complex research questions. According to this design, single data can not be fully adopted as it is insufficient. The method will be appropriate considering the research questions that need to be answered and the fact that the data involved needs intensive analysis.

The design appears useful in this study as there is need to embed the qualitative study within the quantitative components. Working on the qualitative data as a subset of the quantitative facts will allow proper treatment and examination of the holistic process, as well as the proper, follow up the analysis. The design involves the collection of both qualitative data and quantitative data but of them must play a supplemental part (Creswell 2006, p.68). The significant of the embedded method is that in the case of this research the quantitative data might help in answering some parts of the research question while the qualitative data address the rest then converge to explain the results. The critical question arising from the embedded method is to whether single data entry can give expected results without being supplemented by the secondary data. For a meaningful use of this method, therefore, both entries must make sense to the overall results (Creswell 2006, p.69).

The merits associated with the embedded method is that it is useful when the researcher have insufficient time and resources for extensive qualitative and quantitative data collection. Therefore one data type is given less priority than the other. Also, the method is manageable because one technique requires less data than the other. The method may be appealing to funding supports as the primary focus of the design is customarily quantitative, such as a correlational analysis or an experiment (Creswell 2006, p.70). Unlike the triangulation design, embedded do not seek to converge the two sets of data to answer the same questions. The researcher may choose to keep the two sets and address them in separate reports.

However, there are many challenges associated with the model especially in with the variants of the design. The researcher, in this case, must specify for the sole purpose of collecting qualitative facts as the portion of the superior quantitative study or collecting quantitative data as part of a larger qualitative study. Therefore to avoid this, the researcher must state the chosen primary and secondary data. In some aspects, dificulties arises in the integration of the results when the two techniques are used to answer diverse research questions (Creswell 2006, p.71). Nonetheless, few examples concerning the embedded have been written especially in embedding quantitative facts within customarily qualitative designs.

Quantitative Data

In this portion, the study will focus on the quantification of information from statistical facts. The targeted population is the UK population including the immigrants from central and eastern Europe. Between 2005 and 2015 the UK recorded increase in the gross domestic product from 6000 to about 7300. Also regarding tax contribution, the Eastern Europe immigrants to the UK recorded an elevated ratio of about 1.25. That is for tax contribution to benefit and other government expenditure. Before the grant to free movement the ratio about 1% especially in the year 2003 (Pettinger 2016). According to the Bank of England study, 10% of the immigrants led to a fall in wages of about 0.31%. For semiskilled and unskilled workers the 10% increase in the number of immigrants corresponded to the reduction of wages to about 2% (Pettinger 2016).

According to the British labour force survey regarding the skilled personnel, the average mean of the natives and immigrants were 0.246 and 0.313 respectively. The semiskilled also was 0.397 and 0.361 for native and immigrants respectively. In addition to that, the unskilled population provided a mean of 0.356 and 0.326 for native and immigrants respectively (Dustmann et al. 2005, p.330). The net fiscal indicates that central nad Eastern Europe immigrants contributed almost £ 5 billion and most of it is attributed to the joining of this countries in the period between 2004 and 2007 (Tetlow 2016 ). On the same report, the impact of the immigrants on the UK-born wages has been about 1% in the period of 8 years since the 2004 enlargement.

In another statistical data by the labour force survey the UK-born unemployment percentage rate was about 10 in 1995 which later recorded a decrease between 2000 and 2005 recording about a percentage rate of 4. The percentage rate rose to about seven between the 2008 and drastically back to 5 in 2015 (Wadsworth et al. 2016, p.6). Real hourly wages between increases from £ 8 in 1995 to above £11 in 2007 which then records a decrease to £11 in 2015. At the same notion, the immigrants working class in the UK rises from 2% in the year 2004 to above 6% in the year 2015 (Wadsworth et al. 2016, p.7).

Qualitative Data

In this section observation of the existing facts of the impact of the central and eastern Europe immigration shall be focused. Over the years UK population have been dragging behind as compared to some of the european countries. Uk has been ranked 31st out of the 38 European countries. In the year 2004-2005 the migration accounted to two-thirds of the population change in the UK (Blanchflower et al. 2007, p.2). This can be attributed to the grant of free movement of the A8 countries to the UK. According to Blanchflower et al. (2007), the central and eastern Europe citizen opted to migrate to the UK in a notion that there are higher living standards and the higher probability of getting a job.

However, some of the immigrants didn’t stay in the UK for long given that most of them migrated on contract employment basis (Blanchflower et al., 2007 p.9). The A8 migrants also were more likely to work in the manufacturing, distribution, construction, restaurant and hotels leaving the natives and non-A8 to work in the public sectors. It is noted that most of the immigrants make up a noteworthy impact in the agricultural sector of the UK’s economy (McCollum and Findlay 2011).

There is a notable difference to the immigrant before the 2004 enlargement and after the 2004 enlargement. Most of the pre-enlargement population seems to be less active in the labour market especially students. They do not engage in paid employment unless it is self-employment. Unlike the post-enlargement population they are economically inactive (Longhi and Rokicka 2012, p.20). The difference in behavior of the two groups can be explained regarding the core purpose of migration to the UK. The pre-enlargement population might have come to the UK for purposes such as settlement rather than the pursuit of better employment opportunities.

Ethical Considerations

Ethics are standards of conduct that distinguish between right and wrong. Ethical considerations are critical to research as they determine the acceptable an unacceptable acts in conducting a research program.Ethical issues that might associate with this work include fabrication or false of data. This is dangerous as it can lead to deviation of the research purpose regarding reliable results or outcomes. Throughout my study, I will stick to the facts collected for the reliability of my research works. In the case where the research work will require assessment of the human subjects, it is critical and ethical too to seek permission before the process.

Other ethical issues to be considered is the human right conflict of interest and the compliance with the federal law. Also, it is researcher’s duty to ensure that human subjects involved in the research program are not violated in any way. This is critical as it guarantees integrity in the study in question. In some aspects stating the actual budget without suspicion is essential and my work will adhere to honesty. It is also equally important to consider and respect other people’s and more importantly avoid plagiarism.To avoid plagiarism in this work therefore, correct and proper citations shall be put in place.

Conclusion

Despite the increased concern on the level of population A8 immigrants to the UK, and the negative impacts perceived to be associated with the immigration, the UK stands to benefit economically from the immigrants. The inflow of the new talents and young innovative immigrants proves to be a boost to the UK economy. However, the data predicts that the benefits might not last for long. As outlined in the stipulated data, UK benefit through taxes from the working immigrants as the immigrants claim less or no benefits from the government. In the later dates most of the working class of the immigrants will be out of the labour market, and therefore they shall be relying on the government for benefit schemes. The data also proved that the issue of unemployment in the UK could not be blamed on the immigrants as the increase is significantly low. Raising migration bans might not address some the economic issues in today’s economic world. It is, therefore, the mandate of the authorities involved to establish the policy to cope and sustain population increase.

References

Blanchflower, D., Saleheen, J. and Shadforth, C., (2007). The impact of the recent migration from the Eastern Europe on the UK economy. [Online] Available at: http://repec.iza.org/dp2615.pdf [Accessed 8 May 2017].

Creswell, (2006) . Choosing a Mixed Methods Design. [Online] Available at: file:///C:/Users/user/Downloads/MIxed%20Method%20Design.pdf[Accessed 8 May 2017].

Dustmann, C., Fabbri, F. and Preston, I., (2005). The Impact of the Immigration on the British Labour Market. The Economy Journal, Issue 115, pp. 324-341.

Lemos, S. and Portes, J., (2008). New Labour?The Impact of Migration from Central and EasternEuropean Countries on the UK Labour Market. [Online] Available at: http://ftp.iza.org/dp3756.pdf [Accessed 7 May 2017].

Longhi, S. and Rokicka, M., (2012). European immigrants in the UK before and after the 2004 enlargement: is there a change in immigrant self-selection?. [Online] Available at: http://www.norface-migration.org/publ_uploads/NDP_30_12.pdf[Accessed 7 May 2017].

Marangozov, R., (2008). What are the impacts of economic migration to the UK?. [Online] Available at: http://www.employment-studies.co.uk/news/what-are-impacts-economic-migration-uk [Accessed 7 May 2017].

McCollum, D. and Findlay, A., (2011). Centre for population change. [Online] Available at: http://www.cpc.ac.uk/publications/cpc_briefing_papers/pdf/BP5_East_and_Central_European_Migration.pdf [Accessed 8 May 2017].

Pettinger, T., (2016). The Impact of Immigration on UK Economy. [Online] Available at: http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/6399/economics/impact-of-immigration-on-uk-economy/ [Accessed 8 May 2017].

Smith, B., (2013). Eastern European immigrants ’overwhelming benefit UK economy. [Online] Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/10484225/Eastern-European-immigrants-overwhelming-benefit-UK-economy.html [Accessed 7 May 2017].

Tetlow, G., (2016). EU migration — the effects on UK jobs and wages. [Online] Available at: https://www.ft.com/content/0deacb52-178b-11e6-9d98-00386a18e39d [Accessed 7 may 2017].

Wadsworth, J., Dhingra, S., Ottavian, G. and Reenen, J., (2016). Brexit and the impact of immigration on the UK. [Online] Available at: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/brexit05.pdf [Accessed 8 May 2071].