Tragic: Number of Hungarians leaving the country at historic high
The number of people leaving Hungary is at a historic high. More than 33 thousand people left the country just in 2023, which is the highest number since the Orbán cabinet came to power in 2010. The number of Hungarians who left the country between 2010 and 2024 is 324 thousand. Most choose to live elsewhere because of work or studying and do not want to come home to get much lower salaries, education, etc.
Number of emigrants at historic high
The majority of the Hungarian citizens leaving Hungary and going mostly to work or study in Western Europe is one of the most pressing problems of our country lately. The Hungarian government cannot find a solution since wages are much below the German or British level. They try to promote Hungary as being very safe compared to Western Europe, “conquered” by illegal migrants, but that is chiefly political communication. Only a few people come back compared to the masses that left.
According to 444.hu, in 2023, 33,700 Hungarians left the country, which is the highest number since 2010. The news outlet added they could not find earlier data about the emigration from Hungary. The Hungarian Central Statistical Office (KSH) compiled its list of target countries and numbers based on the interior ministry’s address registry and the social insurance registry of the NEAK.
London. Most Hungarians went to the UK before Brexit.
Lots of people decide to leave Hungary each year
The current number is a rounded, preliminary number. In the last 14 years, 324,179 Hungarians left the country. That is more than Debrecen’s and NyÃregyháza’s number of citizens. In 2010, only 7,318 left, which grew to 32,852 by 2015, fell to 19,322 in 2020 and increased to 33,700 in 2023.
Because of Brexit, the popularity of Great Britain decreased. The most popular destination has become Austria since 2019. In 2023, more Hungarians moved there than the entire number of emigrants in 2010, 2011 and 2012.
Between 2019 and 2021, the number of emigrants remained below the number of Hungarian nationals coming back to Hungary. That is probably because of the coronavirus pandemic and Brexit.
Vienna is close to Hungary but the wages are much higher. In 2023, the number of Hungarians leaving the country was record high.
Demographic deficit is critically high
The balance of those leaving Hungary and moving back stands at minus 105,119. That is the population of Kecskemét.
Hungary has been struggling with its demographic deficit since the 1980s. The number of births is below the number of deaths, and that difference has grown considerably in the last few decades. There is no cure for that, and emigration only made it worse.
As a result, the Hungarian government plans to attract hundreds of thousands of guest workers who do not have a chance to gain Hungarian citizenship but cause lower wages and anxiety among the populace thanks to the Orbán cabinet’s anti-migration campaign.
Old people remain in Hungary. Source: depositphotos.com
The natural population decline was 42 thousand in Hungary in 2023. Emigration and natural decline stand at 75 thousand. Meanwhile, 22 thousand Hungarians came back with lots of guest workers.
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15 Comments
The last smart Hungarian to leave the corrupt political state known as Hungary, please turn off the lights. Let Orban and Fidesz sit in the dark and think about their actions.
This statistic speaks to the complete failure of Fidesz to provide a prosperous society for Hungarians. Everyone already knows it. If you are smart you leave. The senior pensioners who all vote Fidesz can puck themselves while the young leave to find opportunity and live in freedom. It’s just a matter of time. Hungary is on an inevitable slide down until the dictatorship is thrown out.
Word usage, that best describes, when the name Victor Mihaly. Orban is discussed, when considering, after 14 plus years as Prime Minister of Hungary, his “second” attempt, gives you multiple choices.
It’s playing out in fact, besides his Distillation of Democracy in Hungary, through his personal “Crazed” Political Ideologies, the longer, deeper we descend, it’s Nadar an un-known, in this cataclysmic Economic & Financial – “free fall” – the disclosure of broader, wider facts of Orban and his Fidesz Government, it would not be im-proper to look at Victor Mihaly. Orban as a tyrant.
In the expansion of the word tyrant, as we descend into this Nadar as a country to the un-known, it builds seeing acts of blatant cruelness being delivered by the Orban / Fidesz Government, that have, continue on giving “strong” indications, they are a Oppressive Government.
Orban is tyrannical, which concerns me, for the longer he is allowed, to occupy the place in Hungarian Politics he does, what OTHER pages will he turn, in his “Crazed” Political Ideologies, and “force” upon the citizens of Hungary ?
Victor Mihaly. Orban in his Legacy, post his Political Life, it will sooner than later be a Good Read.
For these same reasons, the “immigration” crisis that Victor crows about is a red flag. The people that do get to Hungary pass right on through. For a country to thrive it needs diversity, and diversity is not just having Hungarians in Hungary, it means having foreign born Hungarians that want to work to make Hungary home, it means LGBT Hungarians that want to stay but are afraid of Victor and this thugs, and there are those who are trapped here because they don’t have education or means to leave.
Tell me about it. We train them, the youngsters leave. Incredible destruction of capital. Every end of the month, I worry about who will hand in their notice next – each single one with a university degree and significant effort from us in training them up. And 80 percent go abroad!
No wonder the government is desperate to have international students, temporary workers and tourists, why?
Demographic and emigration led working age decline vs. more pensioners, means more budget stress.
Solution, more taxpaying temporary immigrant residents who contribute financially etc., but neither have access to social security, nor steal from the state.
Of course, it is a huge problem that must be addressed asap! This government will not solve it and third world replacement immigration is suicidal for sure!
Its very funny when i read the controlled journal media in Hungary to say exactly teh opposite, according to hungary today, more and more Hungarians are returning to their motherland. As immigration is being currently handled looks like the Hungary for the Hungarians will not work anymore. The pro family programs are not working, and soon Orban will start to blame about this again to the same imaginary enemies he has. Future doesn’t look that bright.
England’s population meanwhile is growing because of ethnic replacement immigration policies. Even a reduced Hungarian population is better than watching a once great nation die from cultural suicide. RIP UK
This is misleading. The article should add that 37,000 more Hungarian returned to Hungary than left. Please don’t lie like this!
Olvasd el a Világgazdaságon!
Wait till they find out how much the rent, electric bills and shopping are in other countries. Everywhere is bad at the moment because of the elite people raising prices of electricity and gas. Because of proxywars going on. Most of the Hungarians i know who moved to Holland are not making it there anymore with a full time job and moving back to Hungary as soon as they can. I am really thankfull i can live in Hungary! That my son isn’t indoctrinated at school by this woke religion. That the borders are closed of for “people without passports” who come by boat from Africa. People will always find something to complain, but don’t put much effort in themselves to make their life better.
Most of the young that leave will come back to Hungary soon enough. There are problems everyhwere, high taxes in many of these high-salary countries will eat your profits, govts. are increasingly dictatorial and radical-left ideological agendas are destroying societies.
Hungary is loyal to its roots and has strong on family values, if it could create an innovative commercial and technical environment for its own talent to thrive, it would really set itself apart from the rest.
I have been living in the Netherlands for almost 70 years. I have known the Netherlands as a Western state. In the past there was also a large emigration golf to America, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. I understand that many Hungarians are moving to other European countries because the economy is stronger and the merits are higher. But what I do not understand from the many comments here is that Orban and his government are largely the fault of this. What apparently most respondents are not understandable, that he wants to let Hungary exist as a state while most European countries will not in a few years will not to exist. Then it is the fourth empire as Adolf Hitler saw it and then the Christian faith has disappeared and taken over by Islam. What most Hungarians do not understand is that the people who are brought in through boats from Africa Europe is consciously accepted by Brussels because this processes the frame that Brussels advocates the national states. To form 1 Europe, one needs 1 people, 1 language and no 25 languages. One needs 1 government that is no longer there in Brussels and votes for a government. Perhaps the Hungarian people have not realized it yet, but they have lived under a communist yoke for years and had not known democracy. They will lose it again in a few years. If Brussels says Spring, then they only have to ask how high. Where is the Hungarian who rebelled in 1956 against the then reign.
I have a family member leave explicitly saying that they’re scared of the political situation and want to plant roots some place more stable