The ‘Parasitic Migrant’ Myth: Data Shows Migrants Are Funding British Prosperity
While the loudest voices on the far right fill parliamentary corridors and sympathetic media platforms with claims that migrants are “parasites” living off taxpayers’ money, the official statistics tell a very different story — one stripped of emotion, ideology or prejudice.
The headline that right-wing spin machines fear most is this: migrants are among the pillars preventing the British economy from faltering.
It is time to tear away the cloak of distortion worn by the merchants of resentment — not with rhetoric, but with data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and the Migration Observatory’s 2024 reports, which dismantle the myth of the “benefit-dependent migrant” at its roots.
Official Figures: Who Works More?
If contribution and productivity are the benchmark, migrants outperform the UK-born population in the labour market.
ONS data show that employment rates for foreign-born working-age men stand at 83 per cent — significantly higher than the 78 per cent recorded for UK-born men.
That five-point gap is not a marginal detail. It represents hundreds of thousands of additional workers paying income tax, National Insurance contributions and VAT with every purchase.
Among women, the rates are strikingly similar: 71 per cent for foreign-born women compared with 73 per cent for UK-born women. The data hardly suggest a population arriving to live idly. On the contrary, migrants are clearly participating in — and sustaining — Britain’s economic marathon.
Dismantling the “Benefits Dependency” Narrative
For years, welfare claims have been weaponised by sections of the far right as a political scare tactic. Yet the official figures — published under considerable political scrutiny in June — tell a different story.
First, the overwhelming majority of benefit claimants are British citizens. Of the eight million people receiving benefits in the UK, 83.6 per cent are British or Irish nationals.
Second, while approximately one million claimants are classified as “foreign-born”, that headline figure is often misrepresented. Around 700,000 of them are EU nationals who lived and worked in Britain before Brexit and who hold full legal entitlement under settled or pre-settled status.
Third, refugees account for just 1.5 per cent of total claims. Those arriving via designated safe routes — including Ukrainians and Afghans — make up only 0.7 per cent.
For those invested in outrage, the uncomfortable reality is this: migrants who claim benefits are not freeloaders. They are participants in a system they have contributed to, often for years. Indeed, May 2025 data confirm that roughly half of EU nationals receiving Universal Credit are in work — but struggling with Britain’s high cost of living.
Migrants Pay More — and Often Receive Less
Contrary to popular myth, Britain does not open its welfare system to migrants on arrival. The Department for Work and Pensions makes clear that most migrants are barred from claiming most benefits for five full years.
Between 2022 and 2025, total benefit claimants rose from 5.5 million to 7.9 million. Yet the proportion of foreign-born claimants remained broadly stable at between 15 and 17 per cent.
This stability — amid a significant rise in overall claims — undermines the claim that Britain’s welfare pressures are driven by migration. The data instead point to structural domestic challenges: stagnant wages, rising housing costs, and broader economic strain.
The crisis is home-grown, not imported.
So Who Is Sustaining Whom?
When Downing Street talks of tightening migration rules and doubling the qualifying period for indefinite leave to remain, it is not solving an economic emergency. It is engaging in political signalling aimed at appeasing louder, more radical voices.
The migrant workforce in Britain is among the most economically active segments of society. It is proportionally less dependent on welfare than public discourse suggests, and more constrained by eligibility rules than most voters realise. Even undocumented migrants are excluded from public funds entirely.
Britain’s economy does not merely tolerate migrants — it relies on their labour and taxes to fund schools, hospitals and public services used by everyone.
So the next time a politician claims migrants are draining the system, the response should be simple: consult the ONS.
Numbers do not lie.
Politicians sometimes do.
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