Effects of the economic crisis on migrants' remittances

Abstract

Diverse measures have favored this immigration and also the 'regularization' of the illegal population since the financial crisis began in Spain. Spanish population growth since the late twentieth century has primarily been the result of a massive influx of foreigners. The growth rate of immigrants into Melilla (autonomous city) has been very much higher than the national average; this considerable increase in legal immigration in recent years is mainly due to the entry of workers bearing European documents who arrive in Melilla, but who originally came from northern Morocco. Having lost their jobs in other EU countries, they decided to return to Morocco, but remained registered in a European city—Melilla—in order to receive unemployment benefits and not to lose their acquired rights of residence