Brexit Exodus Trickling Toward a Steady Stream?

The exodus fomented by Brexit may be quickening.   As noted by sources including CNN Money, data shows that 117,000 individuals, who have citizenship in European countries but who were residing in the U.K, left Britain last year.

That’s a whopping 36 percent boost over 2015’s figures.  The migration, of course, comes in the wake of Brexit and a wave of questions over who lives where, where they can work, and even how they’d get paid.  The fact remains that the legal status of non-Britons living in Britain remains rather unclear, and is a key negotiating point in talks between the UK and Europe.  The outflow comes as net migration from the EU has also slipped in 2016, to 133,000 from 184,000 in 2015.  The preponderance of flight has taken wing among eastern European and central European citizens, as they’ve left in droves, up 57 percent year over year in the same timeframe to 57,000.

Money talks and may be spurring the walk.  After all, the pound has slipped in the double-digit percentage rates since the summer 2016 vote, which means that the wages that are typically sent to home countries are worth less when arrive.

This may be a further dampener on economic growth, and drains a pool of three million people who live in the U.K. but hail from elsewhere.

The numbers coming from the U.K. economic data already show a slowdown, as on Thursday it was announced that gross domestic product was up 20 basis points in the quarter (20 basis points less than expected), and less than the 30 basis points seen previously and markedly less than the 70 basis points at the end of last year.  Further data from the Office for National Statistics showed exports off 1.6 percent, and consumer spending, perhaps most alarmingly for payments, slipped to 0.3 percent for the entire quarter versus previous growth of 0.7 percent, and showing the slowest crawl upward since the end of 2014.