Chapter 716 - 331: High Birth Rate, High Death Rate (Part 3)

The reasons for these Portuguese heading to Spain are quite simple: they can find higher-paying jobs in Spain, and it’s not difficult for Portuguese people to acquire Spanish nationality.

Portuguese can understand Spanish, and there isn’t much difference in appearance and cultural disparity between the two sides.

This leads to almost no cost for Portuguese to transform into Spaniards, which is why many Portuguese choose to go to Spain.

Perhaps the Portuguese Government should be thankful that Spain’s Extremadura State is a region with a small population and not much industry.

If the positions of France and Portugal were swapped, and Portugal bordered Spain’s Catalonia, just one Barcelona Industrial Base would be enough to attract a large influx of Portuguese.

Spain’s current per capita income ranks in the upper-middle tier in Europe, higher than Portugal’s per capita income.

And the income of Spanish workers is even higher than the per capita income. If the Spain-Portugal border had large industrial bases, these Portuguese wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation of high-paying jobs.

All European countries have provided Spain with nearly 270,000 immigrants, with the remaining 30,000 immigrants coming from Spain’s colonies.

These 30,000 immigrants are mainly composed of Moroccans, mixed with a small number of indigenous people from the Philippine Colony and people from Lanfang.

Spain has established Spanish language schools in both the Philippines and Lanfang and has corresponding immigration introduction plans.

Currently, these two regions can provide Spain with over a thousand immigrants each year. Although not many, it’s still a relatively stable source of immigration.

The main reason is that these two regions are too far from Spain’s mainland, and immigrants must bear the cost of the boat trip themselves. Unless they meet Spain’s talent introduction plan, Spain will not provide tickets to the mainland.

However, under the premise of bearing the cost themselves, they can still attract over a thousand immigrants each year to Spain’s mainland, which shows Spain’s attraction to the population of these two regions.

Although there is an inflow of 300,000 people, it does not mean that Spain has no outflow of people.

According to customs and city statistics, in 1885 alone, Spain lost about 30,000 people.

However, nearly 20,000 of them were actively transported by Spain, with a considerable part being Catalans or Basque.

Transporting them to Spain’s colonies not only fills the gap in the Spanish population but also addresses the issue of Navarre State and Catalonia State’s desire for independence, truly killing two birds with one stone.

Besides the 20,000 actively transported by Spain, the remaining over 10,000 are genuine immigrants who voluntarily chose to move to other countries.

For those who wish to leave Spain for other countries and lands, Carlo neither retains them nor prevents them.

In this era, the inflow and outflow of immigrants are normal. For Carlo, only those willing to stay in Spain and appreciate and recognize this country are his people.

Naturally, Spain’s various welfare policies and subsidies are only for these genuine Spaniards, who belong to Carlo’s people.

Those who choose to leave Spain for other countries, of course, can no longer enjoy Spain’s various policies and subsidies.