Where people are migrating around the world, in one incredible graphic

To fill this gap, Nikola Sander, Guy Abel and Ramon Bauer of the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital used statistical missing data methods to analyze the global flow of migrants. Using data on the changes in migrant stock over time, they estimate the five-year flows that are required to account for the differences in the data. The graphic above shows the results for 2005-2010 for the top 50 sending and receiving countries.

Here’s how to read the graphic: Each country is assigned a color. The arcs across the circle, which represent flows of migrants, have the same color as their country of origin. For each flow, the authors left a gap at the destination country, but no gap at the country of origin. The width of the flow indicates its size, while tick marks indicate gross migration (in + out of a country) in 100,000 people.

The graphic offers some pretty amazing insights into the global flows of people. A large yellow band near the top of the graphic shows the nearly 2 million Mexicans that immigrated to the US between 2005 and 2010. The graphic also shows substantial flows from China, India and the Philippines into the US. Those who left the US, on the other hand, were most likely to go to European countries.

The graphic also tracks fascinating flows in other parts of the world. Countries like the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Bangladesh claim outsized portions of the graphic for their populations. For example, note the huge flow of migrants from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines into the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which have a high demand for guest workers.

If you like this graphic, it’s worth checking out the interactive version, which lets you click on a region to see the country-by-country flows, as well as look at data for different time periods. H/t to Max Roser, who runs the fascinating blog Our World in Data.

— Ana Swanson March 16 at 2:03 pm