Immigrants’ level of education lower and unemployment higher than OECD average

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To attract well-educated immigrants and to provide them with work has proved a big challenge to Finland, a new Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development publication reveals.
      An extensive OECD study published on Wednesday indicates that the level of education of immigrants in Finland is lower and their rate of unemployment higher than the OECD average. The report is based on statistics compiled around the year 2000.
      Of all the OECD countries, only Finland, Germany, and the United States had an immigrant population with a level of education lower than that of the original inhabitants.
      The indicator used was university education: 23 percent of those born in Finland had a university degree. The corresponding figure for the country’s immigrant population was 19.
     
Only in two OECD countries, Finland and Belgium, were less than half of the immigrants in employment.
      Still, in nearly all of the countries those originating from elsewhere suffered from unemployment more than the original population.
      Furthermore, there were significant differences between various groups of immigrants. The employment rate of the Somalis living in Finland was only 21 percent, against the 41 percent of those originating from the former Soviet Union area.
      According to the OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría, the result of the study speaks of a need to target immigration policies better, in order to render immigration more successful. "This in turn will help reduce the risk of political backlash against immigrants", Gurría said in Paris.
      "Much greater emphasis needs to be put on helping recent immigrants learn the host-country language and become familiar with workplace practices."


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Illiterate immigrants learn Finnish in order to train for further education (27.11.2007)
  Immigrants in Helsinki learning Finnish and finding work more easily (26.5.2006)

Links:
  OECD Press Release

Helsingin Sanomat