How is the West Midlands' population changing? Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report which found a positive correlation between the probability of a migrant returning to their home country and relatively better unemployment rates in their home country compared to host country. The OECD produce an annual report on international migration and in the 2009 report say that “Net migration has tended to decline during past economic downturns, because employers need fewer workers, there are fewer job opportunities to attract immigrants and because governments themselves modify policies to reduce entries, for example by setting lower numerical limits on labour migration where these exist or by removing certain occupations from labour shortage lists.” (OECD, 2009, p2) Overall, it appears that economic conditions may play a role in determining levels of economic migration at an international level but the multiple and complex reasons behind migration mean that it is difficult to say what impact, if any, the current recession will have on levels of migration. Natural change – births and deaths Natural changes in the population occurring as a result of changes in the numbers of births and deaths seem unlikely to be affected by a recession and this is shown in the data. Over the last century there were three main peaks in the number of births in the UK, the first two after each of the world wars and the third, larger, peak during the 1960s. Since the early 1990s st the number of births in England fell and then started to rise again at the beginning of the 21 century. The number of deaths has remained more constant, below the number of births, with small peaks around the world wars and a gradual reduction since the 1980s. In general these trends do not relate to changes in economic conditions but rather much wider social changes. References Champion, T (2005) ‘Population movement within the UK’ in ‘Focus on people and migration. Office for National Statistics Local Government Association (2009) ‘Impact of the Recession on Migrant Labour’ OECD (2009) ‘International Migration Outlook summary’ Salt, J (2008) ‘International Migration and the United Kingdom’ Migration Research Unit, University College London
How is population change understood across the region? Understanding how the population is changing is important for local authorities in the region as they need to know how any changes might affect future service needs. Population projections are important for local authorities as they enable: anticipation of short-term service requirements; planning for specific changes in population structure (e.g. the ageing population will have an impact on the need for social services); budget setting; and strategic planning for the longer term. The Office for National Statistics (ONS) provides a set of sub national population projections every two years (the latest release are 2006-based populations projected to 2031). These projections are trend based and take into account births, deaths, internal and international migration. Although the projections are widely used, as they provide a consistent method for modelling population change, there are some problems with them. As they are based solely on past trends they do not take account of any policy changes nor do they provide any scope for taking account of particular changes that might be happening at a local level. They are also only available down to local authority level. Therefore many local authorities and other service providers also use other population models alongside the ONS population projections. The West Midlands' Changing Population
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