40 Chapter 3 the highest proportions of EU citizens living and working within their borders. Concerning emigration, the largest groups of mobile citizens in absolute numbers are Romanian, Polish, Italian, Portuguese, and German. Although, as a share of the respective country of origin’s resident population – Romanians, Lithuanians, Croatians, Portuguese, and Latvians are the most mobile. These five countries each have between 10 and 20 percent of their resident population abroad (Eurostat, 2017c). EU mobile citizens have, on average, higher employment rates than their respective non-mobile counterparts (Eurostat, 2017a). Hence, searching for work abroad may present more opportunities than at home. Favell (2008) argues that EU enlargement and freedom of movement has enabled a distinctly European migration system characterised by temporary, opportunistic, and circular movements which are “governed by the ebb and flow of economic demand, [rather] than by long-term permanent immigration” (Favell, 2008, p. 703). Although in a case study of the Netherlands, Strockmeijer, de Beer and Dagevos (2019) find that only a very small proportion of Central and Eastern European (CEE) migration can be considered circular and that a larger number actually engage in permanent settlement. Perhaps this suggests a shift in decision making over the long run, from short-term opportunistic movements to long-term settlement as EU freedom of movement matures. Unfortunately, there is also a trend of inefficient allocation of labour and skills across EU borders because EU10 migrants tend to have, on average, higher educational attainment than the native population, yet often accept lower-skilled jobs contributing to considerable skill mismatch, underemployment, and wasted human capital across the EU (Galgóczi & Leschke, 2012). Moreover, many CEE labour migrants are in precarious employment or face exclusion and exploitation in the country of destination’s labour market (Favell, 2008; Favell & Hansen, 2010). Unfortunately, none of these studies are able to draw on any specific statistics to identify the size and scale of stocks and flows of intra-EU labour migration despite calling for politicians to base their policy on demographic trends and dynamics. Where figures do exist, proxies such as total foreign population from CEE countries is used to represent ‘labour flows’, despite it capturing more than just labour migrants. However, there is no single data source that adequately captures intra-EU labour migration for international, cross-country comparison. A number of newspaper articles, scholarly articles, and reports from various sources rely on total migration statistics, such as total number of EU10 citizens resident in a certain EU15 host nation, to support their arguments when discussing intra-EU labour mobility or CEE workers (e.g. Grabbe, 2001; D’Auria, Mc Morrow & Pichelmann, 2008; Koikkalainen, 2011; Galgóczi & Leschke, 2012; O’Brennan, 2013). The assumption is that total migration is an appropriate proxy for labour migration. A study by Cappelen and Midtbø (2016) explores how EU mobile citizens to Norway have affected public support for the welfare state and argue
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