The fiscal impact of migration and welfare receipt among immigrants

Today (10 June) sees the publication of two ESRI reports, funded by the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration. One report is a review of the international literature on the impact of immigration on public funds. The second report goes into more depth about a specific aspect: welfare receipt rates among immigrants in Ireland.

International literature on the impact of immigration on public funds:

• Existing comparative research shows that immigrants in Ireland make a positive fiscal contribution, fully financing their share of public services.
• During the immediate post-recession period, both foreign-born and Irish-born residents had a negative fiscal contribution, due to budget deficits.
• On average over the last twenty years, foreign-born residents have made a higher fiscal contribution than Irish-born residents. Fiscal impact varies by sub-group, with work-related migration generally having the most positive fiscal impact.
• In Ireland, migrants are younger and, on average, more likely to be employed than the non-migrant population, contributing to their positive fiscal impact.
• Non-EU migrants in Ireland have very high employment and tertiary education rates. This contributes to the fact that they have a higher fiscal impact in Ireland compared to non-migrants; in many other EU countries, they have a lower fiscal impact than non-migrants.
• It should be noted that this report focuses on the impact of migrants on public finances, rather than the impact of migration on the economy. For the most part, this literature does not reflect the broader effects of migration on the economy or labour market.

Rates of receipt of welfare payments by immigrants in Ireland 

• This report uses nationally representative data from the Central Statistics Office to assess whether immigrants in Ireland are more or less likely to be in receipt of social welfare payments compared to Irish-born people.
• Overall, the findings show that there is no general pattern of immigrants being more likely to be in receipt of welfare compared to the Irish-born, as receipt varies across groups and payment types, and the differences are generally small.
• Taking a broad set of payments that includes unemployment, sickness/disability and family/children-related welfare payments (including universal child benefit), 56 per cent of the Irish-born received at least one of these payments in 2024, compared to 61 per cent of immigrants. However, as this includes universal payments reflecting different family structures, a more nuanced picture emerges when we look in greater detail at specific payments and demographic factors.
• Looking at specific payments, e.g., unemployment-related payments, the report found either no difference between immigrants and the native-born (9 per cent for both) or lower rates of receipt among immigrants (e.g. disability benefit rates of 4 per cent and 6 per cent for the Irish-born).
• A more complicated picture emerges when immigrants were separated by global regions of birth. Looking at unemployment-related payments, the rate of receipt for the Irish-born over the period 2014 to 2024 was 16 per cent. The rates of receipt are lower for immigrants from EU-West (13 per cent) and Asia (12 per cent) but higher for EU-East (21 per cent) and Africa (21 per cent).
• Differences in socio-economic characteristics can explain differences in social welfare receipt. For this reason, the report looks at rates of receipt across immigrants and the Irish-born while controlling for factors such as age, education and labour market experience.
• Looking at unemployment, sickness and disability payments combined, and controlling for socio-economic characteristics, the analysis shows that immigrants from the UK and the EU-East have higher rates of receipt, but immigrants from the EU-West have lower rates compared to the Irish-born. No differences are found when comparing the native born to immigrants from Asia and Africa.
• The large inflow of Ukrainian immigrants since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022 is underrepresented in the survey data used in the report. However, other available specific data from the Central Statistics Office suggests that the proportion of Ukrainians of working age who were in receipt of working age supports fell from over 70 per cent in mid-2022 to just over 40 per cent in mid-2025.

The results show that there is no overall evidence of a systematic difference in welfare receipt rates between immigrants and the Irish‑born. Previous research shows that some groups of immigrants experience labour market challenges. Providing supports for this group can be valuable in aiding exits from welfare. Such interventions can be viewed as part of the broader suite of supports which are offered to all eligible people, both Irish-born and immigrants.