A report published by the UN on the issue of international emigration confirms that the exodus of millions of individuals from their countries of origin, principally for economic reasons, has a positive impact in the receiving nations not only on account of resolving problems of unskilled worker shortages, but also, increasingly, by supplying highly educated migrants.

Migrants, as a general rule, take on jobs that are low paid and that natives of the receptor countries consider less appealing. This is the case in the U.S. agricultural sector where millions of emigrants from Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean come for work.

Likewise, developing countries in Asia –including the giants such as India, Indonesia and the Philippines—contribute migrants to nations with strong economies, as much on account of their industrial development – Republic of Korea and Singapore – as their oil exports – Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates.

With data from the UN Population Division, the report maintains that 191 million individuals were classified as migrants last year. Nearly 60%, 115 million, left their country of origin for industrialized nations, but 75 million emigrated to other developing nations wealthier than their own. It is worth noting that South-South migration has increased in importance as barriers imposed by the countries of the North have become more insuperable.

Germany and Spain, with four million each, received more immigrants than any other European country while the United States gained 15 million immigrants. In terms of gender, nearly half of all immigrants are women, who are more concentrated in industrialized countries. In these countries, female immigrants are frequently obliged to work in degrading jobs. By continent, Europe shelters 34% of all migrants; U.S. and Canada, 23 %, and Asia, 28%. Only 9% are living in Africa, 3% in Latin America and the Caribbean and the remaining 3% in Oceania.

In the United States and Europe agricultural work is the principal source of employment for immigrants, although the countries of the North are obtaining a growing number of highly qualified migrants.

This group has continually increased its presence among immigrants. In 1960, the developed countries of Eastern Europe hosted 12 million immigrants with university degrees; this figure rose to 20 million by 1990.

The developing countries are contributing to this intellectual, scientific and technical brain drain to the detriment of their own aspirations of progress.

To have an idea of the magnitude of this phenomenon, suffice it to say that between 33 and 55 % of all highly-educated individuals from Angola, Burundi, Ghana, Kenya, the Mauritius Islands, Mozambique, Sierra Leona, Uganda and Tanzania have left their countries to live in developed European nations.

But the proportion is even higher in other developing nations: no less than 60% of highly educated persons from Jamaica, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Fiji have left their homelands.

Emigration also has a devastating effect on families in the emitting nations. Many families, especially in poorer countries, lose their male family heads to the search for work.

Illegal emigration is the tragic aspect of this movement, fed by the desperation of millions of individuals who lack employment and means of sustaining themselves and their families in their country of origin. The Mexico-U.S. border – now in the processes of fortification on the U.S. side – has been the scene of many fatal incidents: the border patrol has fired on – sometimes killing – alleged violators of the perimeter. Many migrants have also drowned trying to cross the Río Grande.

In a unique case, designed to encourage politically motivated immigration, the U.S. government offers residency to Cuban citizens who succeed in entering U.S. territory, no matter the method used, which is usually illegal: this policy is known as "dry foot" (the migrant stays in the United States); "wet foot" (the migrant is returned to the island.)

This policy has inspired clandestine exits from Cuba by means of paid pirates in speedboats as well as non-professional ones aboard precarious craft. On many occasions, both ways have cost human lives.

Although they do not enjoy the same privilege as Cubans, a large number of Haitians have drowned in attempts to reach the United States or Puerto Rico in totally unseaworthy, makeshift vessels, driven by the desperation of abject poverty.

There is a similar situation in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic with small vessels loaded with African migrants trying to reach southern Europe and the Canary Islands. Seldom does a week pass without the European press publishing the tragic news of the death of would-be immigrants at sea.

But international emigration also has an aspect that some consider positive: family remittances, which in 2005 totaled $232 billion ($102 billion in 1995). Of all these transfers, $167 billion (72%) went to developing countries. Although many families count on those remittances to survive, this habitually distorts national economies and make them even more dependent.

One third of this sum was destined for only four countries: India, China, Mexico and France. At the same time, remittances make up the main part of the gross domestic product of the Philippines, Serbia and Montenegro.