Mexican Immigration Declining; More Are Returning Than Arriving

“The Mexicans are going!” could well be the parting cry from many Americans after a new Pew survey released this week revealed that more Mexicans have been leaving to return home than arriving in the United States.

A new Pew Research Center analysis of newly available government data from both countries showed that the desire to reunite with families was the main reason behind the trend.

The fall in net migration from Mexico to the U.S.is also reflected in the dwindling number of Mexicans who say people with whom they are close are living north of the border.

According to a Mexican National Survey of Demographic Dynamics for 2014, there were 1 million Mexicans who chose to leave the us for Mexico from 2009 to 2014 with their families.

From 2005 to 2009, census data from the US and Mexico cited by Pew showed about the same number of Mexican nationals entering the country as leaving.

Part of the reason for that dip, researchers suggested, was the slow recovery of the United States economy after the Great Recession, which made Mexico’s northern neighbor less attractive.

Mark Hugo Lopez, director of Hispanic research at the Pew Research Centre, said he did not know know how much of an impact the Pew findings will have in this presidential race. Since then, the Mexican-born population has declined, falling to 11.7 million in 2014, as the number of new arrivals to the US from Mexico declined significantly (Passel et al., 2012); meanwhile the reverse flow to Mexico from the U.S.is now higher. Through in stricter enforcement of immigration and employment laws, weariness of living under the radar, and other factors also make life harder in the USA for illegal newcomers than the environment former immigrants found.

During the same time period, the PRC found that about 1 million people went the opposite way, returning to Mexico from the USA, a net minus. But apprehensions of non-Mexican migrants, mostly from Central America, totaled 253,000, the first year that border agents caught more non-Mexicans than Mexicans.

Reviewing Mexican census data, Pew reported that most Mexicans left the United States “of their own accord”, with about 6 in 10 migrants who returned home saying they were reuniting with family members. In addition, Lopez cited increased border security and Mexico’s booming economy.

Mexicans who remain in the US seem more detached from their homeland than before.

While nearly half (48%) of adults in Mexico believe life is better in the US, a growing share says it is neither better nor worse than life in Mexico.