Immigrants make higher fiscal contribution than Irish-born, study finds

James Cox

New research suggests immigrants in Ireland contribute more to the public finances than Irish-born residents.

A separate report, also published on Wednesday, finds foreign-born residents are no more likely than Irish-born people to rely on welfare payments.

The Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) research “consistently finds that immigrants in Ireland have more positive fiscal impacts than natives, even during the downturn”.

The ESRI's Professor Alan Barrett said researchers found that immigrants make a positive fiscal contribution in most countries.

Prof Barrett said: "The studies that have been done for Ireland confirm that is the case. Indeed, in Ireland the effect is even stronger, because we're quite unusual in Ireland in the sense that our migrants are typically quite well educated, very employment-orientated... so it seems unambiguous that they made that positive fiscal contribution."

The report finds that migrants in Ireland are younger and more likely to be employed than the non-migrant population.

“This indicates that migrants entirely finance their own share of public goods, while also contributing to financing pure public goods which the state would need to pay for regardless of the presence of migrants in the country,” the report states.

Both reports were funded by the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration. The reports used data from the Central Statistics Office.