Useful new stats from Home Office on how asylum applicants travel to the UK

Significant increase in applications from people on visas (mostly work, study or visit), not just small boats

Also large differences by nationality: Pakistani and Bangladeshi applicants much more likely to come on visas

I’ve always wondered how employers & workers split the cost of UK immigration fees

Here it is for Skilled Worker visas from a Home Office survey of sponsors

Surprisingly little variation by industry/employer size (in underlying data tables)

www.gov.uk/government/p...

Interesting paper: survey experiment finds US public are unconvinced by economic arguments in favour of admitting refugees, more convinced by moral arguments

Legal arguments only convincing on the left

journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

@sblinder.bsky.social

Pleased to share my new article in Migration Studies @MigrationJrnl on why it’s so much harder than it sounds for government to select the “best and brightest” migrants

I illustrate using the example of two widely criticized 'investor visa' programmes
academic.oup.com/migration/ar...

What rights do unauthorised migrants get?

Interesting new paper looks at what rights 28 European countries give ppl without legal right to be there

Most countries allow access to emergency care & kids' schooling, few (unsurprisingly) offer financial support

cadmus.eui.eu/entities/pub...

2. BUT Home Office data don’t show any obvious correlation between number of good weather days and boat crossings over long term

Any why would it? Much more plausible that a few consecutive days' bad weather affects *timing* of crossings rather than total number in long term

Deeply sceptical about argument that long-term increase in small boat crossings results from weather

Here’s why – but I'm interested in any counterarguments!

1. Yes, weather affects crossings *in short run*. That is clear in data

Also more crossings in summer, when risk of death is lower... 1/n

Calling UKRI-funded doctoral students interested in migration!

Apply for an internship with the Migration Advisory Committee - deadline 8th Sept

www.ukri.org/apply-for-fu...

Asylum accommodation has shifted a lot over the last 6 years. More hotels but also much higher share in London & SE than under the previous dispersal policy

See our new briefing on asylum accommodation for the background

migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/br...

New stats from Home Office: 37% of 2024 asylum applicants arrived on a visa, slightly more than on small boats

The remaining 31% will presumably have arrived on other clandestine routes (e.g. lorry), at port/airport with fraudulent docs or via Ireland

...

Interesting paper on migration & UK training after EU enlargement
➤Migration ➔big drop in formal employer training but only of "less valuable" NVQs, not apprenticeships
➤Bigger impact on older workers &low-skilled jobs
➤economic effect "not likely to be great" due to training/worker groups affected

Useful new HMRC data on earnings by nationality, though what we really need is data by immigration status

Earnings differences will often reflect people's visa route: family, asylum, skilled worker, etc

Eg Pakistan/Bangladesh has more family migrants, Philippines more skilled workers

New data answers puzzle of why skilled worker visa applications didn't decrease much despite higher salary thresholds: *grants* are down much more

Applications: down 24% in July-Dec
Grants: down 42%
Refusals & withdrawn: up 58%

Q: will this be temporary blip as employers adjust to new rules?

Trump has proposed selling green cards

US is basically already selling green cards by getting "investors" to lose some money on investments with below-market rates. It's less controversial only because it doesn't *look* like a naked transaction

From my forthcoming book chapter:

New proposals from Policy Exchange for restricting work and study visas