Main Differences Between the Resulting Sample and LastYear’s E.U. Immigrants Study Findings

On average, those who left to the CIS and Serbia tend to be/have the following.

1. They are younger both as a social group and individually. In the E.U., 10% of the immigrants are over 60, while in the transit zone, only 2% fall into this age bracket. In the E.U. sample, 19% emigrated before 2014, whereas in the CIS and Serbia, their number is 20 times as low. However, 93% of the respondents emigrated after the start of the war, twice the proportion observed in the E.U.
2. They are less likely to have children (36% versus 46% of the respondents in the E.U.), which, however, is largely determined by the age difference between the groups.
3. They are less affluent. Among the émigrés in the E.U., 25% own property, and 58% own a car, compared to 17% and 30%, respectively, among the immigrants in the CIS and Serbia. Family income in excess of €3,000 is reported by 62% of the Russian émigrés in the E.U., compared to 35% in the CIS and Serbia.
4. They are more critical of the government. In last year’s E.U. sample, 12% approved of Putin’s policies, while 71% disapproved of them, a sixfold difference. In the “transit zone” sample, only 2% fully or partially support Putin’s policies, whereas 89% are critical of them, constituting a 45-fold difference.
5. They are more financially tied to Russia and less to their country of residence. Among the émigrés in the E.U., only 9% retained their primary source of income in Russia, while 77% earn mainly in their host country. In the new sample, 23% still have their main income source in Russia, and only 37% in their country of residence. A particularly striking finding was that 31% of the respondents indicated their primary income source comes third countries (neither Russia nor their country of residence).
6. They more often retain a “Russian self-identity.” The émigrés are more likely to identify themselves as Russian (54%) and citizens of Russia (50%), compared to 32% and 23%, respectively, among the respondents in the E.U. This, too, is easily explained by the duration of their life abroad.
7. Fewer of them want to come back. A surprising discovery was that the share of immigrants in the CIS, Serbia, and Georgia who seek to return to Russia (8%) was edged by the proportion of would-be returners among the E.U. immigrants (11%). Given the different standards of living, it would stand to reason that the share of those who want to return from the poorer CIS countries should be much higher than a similar demographic based out of the affluent E.U. More likely than not, it can be accounted for by the above difference in the immigrants’median age and the time they left their country

There is no way of safely asserting that the difference does not stem from the sample’s specificity or any other distortions. However, most of the discrepancies we have found look very plausible and are largely determined by the differences in the emigration periods, or waves.

The data obtained in this survey also contributes to a new outlook on last year’s E.U. immigration study findings as well as some emerging trends that can be traced to the duration and history of the immigration.

One pole definitively accommodates the old émigré communities based in Germany and France, 25% and 24% of whose members left Russia before 2014, while 37% and 36% moved countries after the start had started. Occupying a provisional spot is Cyprus where 8% of the immigrants arrived prior to 2014, whereas 67% resettled after the start of the war.

The second pole encompasses the CIS countries where the overwhelming majority of immigrants came after the outbreak of the war. A substantial number of the survey responses fall between these three spots depending on the timing of the immigration.