Migration Should Be a More Nuanced Two-way Street

[arosenberger14]

After reading through the Dev Diary #17 on migration as well as the AAR thread, I've developed some concerns about how migration is portrayed in Victoria 3 both from gameplay and historicity perspectives. While the mechanics outlined in the dev diary appear to do an excellent job of portraying the economic and political "push" and "pull" factors behind historical migration, I think it over-emphasizes the role of political turmoil in prompting mass migration and misses several critical features of historic migration:

• Migration was expensive: It cost a lot of money to obtain transport (especially transatlantic), concentrating migration among "those with transferrable skills and enough resources to emigrate. Those with resources such as land were not constrained by poverty but they had less incentive to move; on the other hand unskilled labourers were often more constrained."
• Previous migration facilitated future migration: people were more likely to go to a country if their family or neighbors had already moved there, forming migration networks that affected both international and domestic migration.
• Return migration was significant: While the majority of migrants remained in their new country, a significant fraction, as many as a third in the US, returned back to their home country. Typically they would immigrate, make some money or get an education in the new country, and then return home to enjoy a better standard of living than they did previously. Remittances to the home country were (and are) also a big economic factor.
• Migration was (is) a highly charged political issue: which shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who hasn't been living under a rock the past decade. Immigration was a source of major political turmoil in nations, with nativism on the one hand and political coalitions dependent on the immigrant vote on the other.

Contrast this to the picture of Mass Migration painted in the Dev Diary and AAR's:

Mass Migration can happen when a particular culture experiences Turmoil, which is a product of having a large number of radicalized pops... Migration Targets are more likely to be created if the Pops in the culture have a low Standard of Living and high Literacy, and particularly likely to be created if there is widespread starvation among the Pops of that culture.

While this does a good job of capturing the political/economic push/pull factors, I think it places too much importance on turmoil and absolute instead of relative poverty in terms of enabling migration. If you look at the gross migration rates from western Europe in 1870-1910 (Bertocchi, Table 1) there isn't a clear correlation between the two; among the highest are the relatively stable Italy, Britain, Norway, and Sweden, while the lowest are France (hardly a picture of stability) and Germany. Great Britain, with its relatively high wealth and political stability was per capita the largest source of global migrants in the timeframe of the game. Based on the Canada and Lippe AAR's however, it appears that migrants can come from pretty much anywhere that allows for it and go anywhere that will take them. Within a decade they'd easily gotten massive population increases by constructing some buildings to make good-paying jobs available, making gaming migration somewhat overpowered and ahistorically easy.

In order to make migration more historically accurate and less overpowered, I'd propose that migration should cost pops money (possibly based on the transport cost and/or technology) and that the presence of migrants in a country should add to the attraction. This would make migration more a long-term strategy where it starts slow and focused in nations with good sefaring capacity like Britain, and then expands in the mid/late game thanks to cheaper transport technology, better financial technologies to fund trips, and the increased pop wealth from industrialization. It would also replicate the historic advantages the US and Canada enjoyed without giving them gamey modifiers as in Victoria 2, while leaving open the potential to make other countries migration targets through a longer term process of trying to improve their transport capacity and attract some "seed" migrants to get the ball rolling on chain migration.


The second gameplay issue with migration is that, as in Victoria 2 and Stellaris, since pops are power migration is by far a benefit exclusively to the receiving country. In terms of raw production power, you always will want to maximize migration to you and minimize migration from you. While there may be some benefit politically to letting angry radicals leave, there's no economic benefit. This is where return migration and remittances could come in handy; if some of your pops would migrate back at a higher wealth, education, or class migration could be an effective way to bootstrap your economy. Imagine playing as a poor country with lots of pops such as Italy, Russia, or China; sending out migrants could be a good way to trade low-value serfs for high value landowners, inventors, or machinists, as happened historically. This would make migration less a zero-sum game and more a two-way street where both the sending and receiving nations can benefit from it.


Finally, while it may have not been showcased, based on the AAR's there appears to be little sociopolitical blowback from accepting a large number of immigrants. It should be obvious why this doesn't make sense historically. Regardless of the factual merits (or lack thereof), in gameplay terms there should be a pushback to mass migration on economic (cheap foreign labor stealing our jobs!), religious (Papists! the horror!), and cultural/racial lines (see stereotypes of the Chinese in the 19th century US). If you're building your industrial nation on the backs of mass immigration, it should come with commensurate political costs both to better represent the actual difficulties that were involved, and to balance out the massive benefit you can get from migration for gameplay reasons.


TLDR:
To ssummarize, I think the devs have a good start of a migration system, but it needs some more nuance to it both to better portray migration and to better balance out the gameplay. Making it expensive for pops to migrate, especially early game, and including the effects of migration networks would help introduce more realistic flows and make migration a slower, more long-term strategy. Meanwhile, introducing return migration and increasing the political instability caused by accepting immigrants would help balance migration by adding economic incentives for nations to send out immigrants and increasing the risk of accepting them.

 

[Eddie121]

Finally, while it may have not been showcased, based on the AAR's there appears to be little sociopolitical blowback from accepting a large number of immigrants. It should be obvious why this doesn't make sense historically. Regardless of the factual merits (or lack thereof), in gameplay terms there should be a pushback to mass migration on economic (cheap foreign labor stealing our jobs!), religious (Papists! the horror!), and cultural/racial lines (see stereotypes of the Chinese in the 19th century US). If you're building your industrial nation on the backs of mass immigration, it should come with commensurate political costs both to better represent the actual difficulties that were involved, and to balance out the massive benefit you can get from migration for gameplay reasons.

All the good things have a cost!

Making it expensive for pops to migrate, especially early game, and including the effects of migration networks would help introduce more realistic flows and make migration a slower, more long-term strategy

It was a factor in the 19th century but IDK whether/how to represent this?
Maybe pop groups buying transportation tickets so that a fraction of them can leave?

Previous migration facilitated future migration: people were more likely to go to a country if their family or neighbors had already moved there, forming migration networks that affected both international and domestic migration.

While the majority of migrants remained in their new country, a significant fraction, as many as a third in the US, returned back to their home country.

Are you suggesting an oil-blot model where pops are attracted to states where their culture is well-represented or even majoritarian?

 

[arosenberger14]

All the good things have a cost!

Yup! Immigration should still be a net positive in most cases, but should come with tradeoffs like everything else.

It was a factor in the 19th century but IDK whether/how to represent this?
Maybe pop groups buying transportation tickets so that a fraction of them can leave?

I'd scale the ability of pops to move on their wealth compared to either transport cost (once it's clearer what that is) and/or some cost based on the technologies of the sending and receiving nations. That way, even if you have a bunch of impoverished starving peasants in Russia in 1840 only a few would be able to migrate elsewhere because the majority couldn't afford the trip. Later on, say in 1900, more could because transport would be cheaper and Russia may have techs representing improved financial institutions that make it easier for people to borrow cash to move. It could also make building up a good transportation infrastructure a critical part to attracting migrants.

Are you suggesting an oil-blot model where pops are attracted to states where their culture is well-represented or even majoritarian?

Something like that would be the end result of including chain migration mechanics, and fit with what happened IRL (see the geographic concentrations of ethnic groups in the US for instance). Dev diary 17 says that migration attraction is based solely on economics, and:

The selection of States for Migration Targets is based on a number of factors, including the state’s Migration Attraction, whether or not the culture is legally discriminated against in the country, and if there is a logical ‘path’ that Pops of the migrating culture would be able to follow from their Homelands to the target (such as trade routes). There is no inherent advantage in certain country ‘tags’ for who gets migrants - the US tends to get migrations because of availability of jobs and land combined with liberal citizenship laws, not because they have a built-in migration attraction bonus.

It seems like Migration Attraction is intended to be pop and nation-independent, so I'd probably model chain migration by adding in some factor to selection of migration targets based off previous migration and/or presence of that culture to represent the self-reinforcing effects of migration.

 

[EGaffney]

There's an ecological fallacy when inferring conclusions from the high average wealth in countries like Britain - namely that it was a place that had massive emigration from its poorest and most peripheral regions. In these cases, the cost hypothesis seems to break down; people borrow or beg to get away to a place where they can work.

It looks to me that when designing large migration waves, Paradox are inspired by events like the Great Famine in Ireland and the 48ers in Germany and Central Europe. The regular day-to-day migration is a separate question, and countries like the UK will get an "advantage" in creating emigrants thanks to their global-scale markets. I think this will also cover the hysteresis hypothesis you mention about the same destinations being persistently popular from a particular origin.

I'd disregard the quantities in the AAR honestly - it's a snapshot of a work in progress, that generated a substantial amount of worry and pushback from the community, maybe unreasonably considering it's a voluntary effort by neondt and not an official view. The AI will get smarter and wreck itself less, so there will be less crisis emigration.

On return migration and remittances, it is absolutely fine that migration is not a win-win. I think you will struggle to find historians of the Mezzogiorno or the Gaeltacht who find that many migrants came home to do high-tech engineering that leapt their regions ahead of the urban national core. Norway's just not representative. In summary, I think it is fine that migration is a factor that helps some countries rocket ahead into global leadership like they did in reality.

Finally, there should be no automatic political penalty for migration. You have countries like the USA where border controls were a minority view for decades and countries like Australia where they were established as national policy. You should be able to pander to this interest group, or not. I would suggest that if people end up insanely rich as in the AAR, they should probably not care much.

 

[arosenberger14]

There's an ecological fallacy when inferring conclusions from the high average wealth in countries like Britain - namely that it was a place that had massive emigration from its poorest and most peripheral regions. In these cases, the cost hypothesis seems to break down; people borrow or beg to get away to a place where they can work.

Does it though? Yes desperate conditions will reduce the threshold for people to move, but they still need to be able to both know that somewhere better exists and get there... that depends on their finances, the local creditory institutions, and whether anyone will pay them to go. Starving poor people in the UK the 19th century didn't go: "I'm starving and can't afford food here, but I hear a new coal mine opened up in the middle of Ontario that would pay me way more than anything here, time to hop on a boat!" It was more like "Shit's bad here, but my second cousin who moved to Ontario seems to be doing well, maybe I'll scrape together what I can for a trip over." Britain had a pretty significant leg up on the rest of the world in both its pre-existing connections with the rest of the world and its advanced maritime economy that meant that more of its poor went even though plenty of people in other countries were as bad or worse off.

It looks to me that when designing large migration waves, Paradox are inspired by events like the Great Famine in Ireland and the 48ers in Germany and Central Europe. The regular day-to-day migration is a separate question, and countries like the UK will get an "advantage" in creating emigrants thanks to their global-scale markets. I think this will also cover the hysteresis hypothesis you mention about the same destinations being persistently popular from a particular origin.

Yeah, nothing wrong with taking the Famine and 48'ers as inspiration, but I think it's important to not over-emphasize their roles and extrapolate out to the rest of the world without looking at the particular circumstances that made both those events possible.

I'd disregard the quantities in the AAR honestly - it's a snapshot of a work in progress, that generated a substantial amount of worry and pushback from the community, maybe unreasonably considering it's a voluntary effort by neondt and not an official view. The AI will get smarter and wreck itself less, so there will be less crisis emigration.

Sure, things will presumably get better and more balanced but that's what we have to work with now. Not to mention that if folks don't highlight the potential issues and just assume everything will be fixed up to turn out OK there's less signaling the devs that this is an area players will care about.

On return migration and remittances, it is absolutely fine that migration is not a win-win. I think you will struggle to find historians of the Mezzogiorno or the Gaeltacht who find that many migrants came home to do high-tech engineering that leapt their regions ahead of the urban national core. Norway's just not representative. In summary, I think it is fine that migration is a factor that helps some countries rocket ahead into global leadership like they did in reality.

Yeah, migration should definitely be a big positive, but it would be good for game balance if it was more a two-way positive than it currently is. Sure the folks going back to Southern Italy and Ireland from the US weren't becoming engineers for the most part... there wasn't the economy for that, but they were using the cash they'd earned abroad to buy land and establish themselves as richer, more productive farmers than they were before heading out. There's also the example of the numerous university students from Asia who wen to Europe or the US for an education and then returned to places like Japan, India, or China and played a huge part in those nation's economic and political history.

Finally, there should be no automatic political penalty for migration. You have countries like the USA where border controls were a minority view for decades and countries like Australia where they were established as national policy. You should be able to pander to this interest group, or not. I would suggest that if people end up insanely rich as in the AAR, they should probably not care much.

We can beat around the bush over what counts as an "automatic penalty," but there should definitely be some friction, probably in the interest groups... things like capitalists wanting immigration for their factories, and native labor being virulently against it to try and maximize their wages. Maybe people shouldn't care if you can create a utopia, but IMO it's a whole different problem if the game mechanics do make it possible to create one.

 

[Eddie121]

Yeah, migration should definitely be a big positive, but it would be good for game balance if it was more a two-way positive than it currently is. Sure the folks going back to Southern Italy and Ireland from the US weren't becoming engineers for the most part... there wasn't the economy for that, but they were using the cash they'd earned abroad to buy land and establish themselves as richer, more productive farmers than they were before heading out. There's also the example of the numerous university students from Asia who wen to Europe or the US for an education and then returned to places like Japan, India, or China and played a huge part in those nation's economic and political history.

Probably part of some larger remittance and foreign investment system. Expatriates who are more likely to invest in their home region etc.

Sure, things will presumably get better and more balanced but that's what we have to work with now. Not to mention that if folks don't highlight the potential issues and just assume everything will be fixed up to turn out OK there's less signaling the devs that this is an area players will care about.

That's for all the yesmen around here!

Maybe people shouldn't care if you can create a utopia, but IMO it's a whole different problem if the game mechanics do make it possible to create one.

The more utopic the living conditions, the MORE resentful your pops will be against immigrants who "don't deserve" the same.

 

[HelmuthM]

The second gameplay issue with migration is that, as in Victoria 2 and Stellaris, since pops are power migration is by far a benefit exclusively to the receiving country. In terms of raw production power, you always will want to maximize migration to you and minimize migration from you. While there may be some benefit politically to letting angry radicals leave, there's no economic benefit. This is where return migration and remittances could come in handy; if some of your pops would migrate back at a higher wealth, education, or class migration could be an effective way to bootstrap your economy. Imagine playing as a poor country with lots of pops such as Italy, Russia, or China; sending out migrants could be a good way to trade low-value serfs for high value landowners, inventors, or machinists, as happened historically. This would make migration less a zero-sum game and more a two-way street where both the sending and receiving nations can benefit from it.

What's the advantage of running Conservative policies then? Liberal policies maximize migration to you and minimize migration from you.

Consider the example of the Russian Empire, the most conservative European country with few individual liberties. I'd argue that the backward policies of the Russian Empire also increased population growth. Russia was the Great Power which experienced the largest population growth in this period. Uneducated Russian peasants had more children than the educated French.

 

[Delterius]

It was a factor in the 19th century but IDK whether/how to represent this?
Maybe pop groups buying transportation tickets so that a fraction of them can leave?

What you want is rich people in the new world funding the migration of potential future serfs/employees.

 

[HelmuthM]

What you want is rich people in the new world funding the migration of potential future serfs/employees.

Except Americans didn’t pay for the transportation of migrants, usually.

 

[Rhel]

What's the advantage of running Conservative policies then? Liberal policies maximize migration to you and minimize migration from you.

The same as in reality I imagine, appeasing existing powerful interest groups that are afraid of losing power if circumstances change.

 

[Sbrubbles]

• Migration was expensive: It cost a lot of money to obtain transport (especially transatlantic), concentrating migration among "those with transferrable skills and enough resources to emigrate. Those with resources such as land were not constrained by poverty but they had less incentive to move; on the other hand unskilled labourers were often more constrained."

One point that I hope makes it into the game, and was extremely relevant for Brazil specifically, but I believe other south american nations as well, was government support for immigration. In Brazil this was done mostly to expand coffee labor in the new (as of the 1850s) coffee plantations in São Paulo, though there was also immigration to other areas from the southern tip up to Rio. This was done historically through many mechanisms, among them:

1) Creation of colonies (setting aside and organizing land in a region for a certain group from the same country, ocasionally but not always with subsidy of passage): relatively sucessful, but expensive and not scalable for large immigration.
2) Private financing of passage, which would be payed through a labor contract. Most of these attempts failed, usually devolving into indentured servitude until violence broke out and foreign emissaries stepped in.
3) Public financing of passage: the government (initially the state of São Paulo, later the federal government) straight up paying for the trip. This was very sucessful, especially in atracting Italian and German immigrants.

So yeah, I hope policies that allow the government to not only allow but incentivize migration make it in.

 

[arosenberger14]

What's the advantage of running Conservative policies then? Liberal policies maximize migration to you and minimize migration from you.

Consider the example of the Russian Empire, the most conservative European country with few individual liberties. I'd argue that the backward policies of the Russian Empire also increased population growth. Russia was the Great Power which experienced the largest population growth in this period. Uneducated Russian peasants had more children than the educated French.

As you say the advantage is to keep your population size maximized (or IG's happy). But with some benefits from return migration or remittances it'd open up more strategies for trading low-education/income pops for fewer better ones, or straight up pops for cash which would be nice.

It'd also be really cool if Victora 3 models the demographic transition well, though that's tricky as we still don't have a good full understanding of nuances like why France had such a low birthrate and the US such a high one.

Except Americans didn’t pay for the transportation of migrants, usually.

Typically not in this period, though there were significant exceptions especially around Asian labor. There was also a big industry that was built up around transporting immigrants, shipping companies especially tried to help advertise and pay... the problem is a transatlantic trip in steerage in 1900 cost $30 which is ~$1000 in today's cash, so not inexpensive!

One point that I hope makes it into the game, and was extremely relevant for Brazil specifically, but I believe other south american nations as well, was government support for immigration. In Brazil this was done mostly to expand coffee labor in the new (as of the 1850s) coffee plantations in São Paulo, though there was also immigration to other areas from the southern tip up to Rio. This was done historically through many mechanisms, among them:

1) Creation of colonies (setting aside and organizing land in a region for a certain group from the same country, ocasionally but not always with subsidy of passage): relatively sucessful, but expensive and not scalable for large immigration.
2) Private financing of passage, which would be payed through a labor contract. Most of these attempts failed, usually devolving into indentured servitude until violence broke out and foreign emissaries stepped in.
3) Public financing of passage: the government (initially the state of São Paulo, later the federal government) straight up paying for the trip. This was very sucessful, especially in atracting Italian and German immigrants.

So yeah, I hope policies that allow the government to not only allow but incentivize migration make it in.

Yes, there should definitely be mechanics you can use to attract immigrants, good examples from Latin America but also Africa and Oceana... though they did have problems both on the side of people not wanting to become basically indentured labor and from governments not wanting to finance them. Would love to see this as well as the shipping industry be more involved with migration than they are now.

 

[HelmuthM]

As you say the advantage is to keep your population size maximized (or IG's happy). But with some benefits from return migration or remittances it'd open up more strategies for trading low-education/income pops for fewer better ones, or straight up pops for cash which would be nice.

Conservative policies don't boost population growth in Vicky though. (Although they arguably should)
France had a pop growth malus in Vic2 just for being France. A policy which France could possibly abandon would be a better one.

Education matters. Living standards matter.
I'd also look for the explanation in the differences French Enlightenment had vis-a-vis American and German Enlightenment. The values of the French Revolution were much more critical towards the Church and traditional values. French women were influenced by early feminism to a greater degree and had fewer babies than Americans or Germans.