Last year, 1.2 million people moved to Britain – almost certainly the most ever. Net migration (i.e., immigrants minus emigrants) to Australia is currently twice the rate before the Covid-19 pandemic. Spain’s equivalent figure recently hit an all-time high. Nearly 1.4 million people on net are expected to move to America this year, one-third more than before the pandemic. In 2022 net migration to Canada was more than double the previous record. In Germany, it was even higher than during the “migration crisis” of 2015. The rich world as a whole is in the middle of an unprecedented migration boom. Its foreign-born population is rising faster than at any point in history.

What does this mean for the global economy? Not long ago, it seemed as if many wealthy countries had turned decisively against mass migration. In 2016 Britons voted for Brexit and then Americans for Donald Trump – both political projects had a strong anti-migrant streak. In the global wave of populism that followed, politicians from Australia to Hungary promised to crack down on migration. Then Covid-19 closed borders. Migration came to a standstill, or even went into reverse, as people decided to return home. Between 2019 and 2021 the populations of Kuwait and Singapore, countries that typically receive lots of migrants, fell by 4 per cent. In 2021 the number of emigrants from Australia exceeded the number of immigrants to the country for the first time since the 1940s.