People overestimate how many immigrants live in their country

Take the United States, for instance. The average American believes a whopping 33% of the population is foreign-born. Yet, official government figures paint a different picture: the actual percentage is closer to 15%. That’s less than half of what people think.
Japan presents a similar scenario. The public in that country estimates 10% of the population to be immigrants. The reality, however, is much lower: around 2%. That means, for every five immigrants people think exist, there’s only one in actuality.

The Global Perception Gap on immigrants

**Read more at Visualcapitalist
I think this difference in perception is because there's a difference in the thing being measured.
This data presented here shows people born overseas.
This is very different to what people perceive as foreign.
For example, you might have a migrant that raises their kids with their foreign culture, language, customs, etc. Those are not counted in this data.
I'm not saying it is good or bad, in the end most of the people in the "new world" are immigrants anyway.
reply
I had the same exact thought, but you articulated it better than I was going to.
reply
The 18 year old who stabbed and killed those girls in London was born in England. His parents migrated from Rwanda.
@nullama the answer this situation is terrible because most immigrants don’t assimilate.
reply
most immigrants don’t assimilate.
I'm not sure if there's enough data to conclude one way or another.
There are heaps of cherry picked examples that showcase each side. For example, Albert Einstein ended up being a quite alright American immigrant, Elon Musk is also another great example of a successful immigrant in the US... also Steve Jobs was the son of a Syrian immigrant, etc...
I think the main issue is that people see immigrants as different, as a "us vs them" mentality, when in reality, they are basically the same.
Of course there are many immigrants causing issues in foreign countries, but also the native population is causing issues there as well. In the same way, immigrants and natives are both doing great things as well.
reply
The famous examples you cited are outliers.
They were all documented. None entered the country illegally.
reply
10 sats \ 0 replies \ @398ja 31 Oct
The average American dies not trust the government official immigration figures. 😎
reply
54 sats \ 1 reply \ @freetx 31 Oct
Yet, official government figures paint a different picture
Yes, the govt lies....
reply
No one knows how many immigrants lack documentation.
In this case the government will have to revise their statistics 📈 up vs the jobs report.
reply
Any good pieces of journalism on why this mass immigration has been happening?
Is it an organic process? Or Are there various NGO's or government programs or UN programs trying to suck in immigrants / encourage and enable people to move to "the west"? (who would not have considered emigrating without the intervention of these organizations)
Basically is the bulk of this immigration happening out of the own free will and self-determined decision-making of the immigrants or are there third parties doing their best and succeeding in making the immigration to happen?
I used to not really think about it and I guess I assumed it was a natural / organic / not-artificially-induced phenomenon but now I'm not so sure.
Would it make a difference in your view which of these scenarios, or in what proportions, were reality?
Also is it known what percentage of the immigration that Europe is dealing with is a result from USA's ( or NATO's) war activities and USA's efforts of "spreading democracy" (and the ripple effects of these / effects downstream of these)?
Holy crap these reality percentages are large percentages
reply
Who guesses 37%? or 21%?
That is awfully specific for a guess
As far as computing "reality", the 'actual' number of illegal or undocumented aliens is a guess/estimate. The chart title should be Perception of citizen vs Perception of researcher
reply
Wouldn't these be averages calculated from a collection of answers?
I live in Western Europe and in some of the biggest cities, judging from the people I see out and about on the streets the native population seems to be a minority in large sections of the larger cities.
On the country-side it is rarer to see non-native people.
I can imagine that if some of these polls occurred in cities and that may be why the guesses are off when correcting for the lower percentages of immigrants outside the cities. The guesses may be accurate for the local region these folks live in but not accurate for the country as whole.
There's also the interesting point someone made here that in these numbers only foreign born people are counted as immigrants and not their children. The children of these people may be confused with immigrants by some of the native population. I guess it also depends on one's definition of "immigrant".
Is rational discussion already possible on this issue, or not yet? For decades anyone trying to talk about the issue of immigration was met with non-arguments intended to shut down discussion.
There even seem to have been cases of stochastic terrorism in some european countries. Seems like that sort of thing was bound to happen given how the corporate media / mockingbird media in "the west" has long demonized voices trying to bring nuance to this discussion about immigration.
Some of the folks trying to raise this issue may have been racists, but surely some of them weren't. And in any case it seems to me we should engage in civil discussion, not name-calling or lying about one's opponents no matter how strongly we may disagree. I can't help but recommend John Stuart Mill's On Liberty; the part about freedom of speech, in this context. Especially for those tempted to shut down discussion. Mill makes some arguments about censorship and how it can backfire relative to the professed goals of the censors. I think these arguments are worth taking into consideration by those tempted to shut down or prevent discussion.
I don't have strong opinions on this topic but the long-time taboo around raising any concerns or nuance around this issue does raise some red flags.
reply
2 minute video of Paris, France
natural organic immigration is fine, but what's happening is many places is an invasion
reply
YES,
This is super crazy and super funny.
reply
When they are all gathered in one place, it skews your perception.
reply
The point is citizens of the west believe there are too many immigrants from the third world saturating their homeland and they are correct.
USA and Europe need to pause all immigration right now and deport immigrants who commit violent crimes.
reply
Aren't these very violent remarks? What if the natives do the crime, they should be sent to he'll?
reply
Remarks are not "violent".
Going to hell is different from deportation or it's a different kind of hell depending on your definition of hell
reply
The United States is a country made by immigrants and the European countries, mainly England, Spain, Portugal, France and the Netherlands, did so in the Americas and on the African continent, exploiting other people's wealth, decimating natives and accumulating capital around slavery, it was a true genocide.
reply