A new EU report exposes imbalances in degree mobility across Europe and the distinct challenges and opportunities arising for net senders and receivers.
As the European Parliament’s and the Council’s positions for the Erasmus+ programme under the new Multiannual Financial Framework 2028–2034 take shape, one thing is clear: student mobility remains at the heart of European education policy. But not all mobility is equal, and governments have political stakes in balancing the inflows and outflows of tertiary students in their respective countries, as a new report by the European Commission shows. The report focuses mainly on degree mobility and is based on multiple data sources, including EU statistics, desk research, 29 country reports, and a foresight analysis.
Although balanced mobility lacks a universal definition within the EU, this new study defines it as a mutually beneficial condition for countries in which they share the greater costs and benefits of in- and outflowing mobility. Importantly, this definition goes beyond a simple comparison of the number of incoming and outgoing students per country, taking into account wider cascading and socio-economic effects. As detailed below, each directional flow comes with distinct benefits and costs for a country, its institutions, and the students themselves. This renewed interest comes against a backdrop of rising international student numbers in Europe, although this trend is largely driven by non-EU students. In contrast, the share of degree-mobile EU students is staying steady at around 2–4% in many countries.
Overall, the report finds that intra-EU degree mobility flows are highly asymmetric, meaning that many countries are either net receivers or net senders of students. This imbalance can be explained through factors including shared language and borders, as well as free tuition, which render some countries particularly attractive. Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Austria, Czechia, and Malta are classified as Europe’s net receivers. The benefits of welcoming foreign students in a country are manifold: institutional income through incurred study fees; consumption of goods and services by students during their stay; as well as labour market participation and subsequent fiscal effects, such as tax contributions, all benefit net-receiving countries. These advantages even go beyond economic effects and include positive demographic impacts by introducing a younger cohort into society, increased cultural diversity, internationalisation at home, and soft power. However, net receivers also encounter unique challenges, such as financing students’ access to public services, housing shortages, the risk of student visa regimes being abused, as well as crowding domestic students out of highly in-demand study programmes. Institutions may face pressure in providing adequate services and housing and in ensuring student integration.
The story is quite different for net senders such as France, Italy, Croatia, Luxembourg, Slovakia, and Cyprus. Whether those countries profit from young people pursuing a degree abroad strongly depends on return rates. Welcoming graduates back home comes with human capital gains through improved language and intercultural skills, extended international networks, and qualifications that may be unavailable at home. On the other hand, net senders face the risk of brain drain in the case of no return. This is exacerbated by low graduate retention rates of incoming students in those countries, resulting in demographic and fiscal pressures. From an institutional perspective, the report highlights the risks of shrinking student cohorts and a threat to many institutions’ mission, namely providing qualified graduates to their local economies. Therefore, some net-sending countries are introducing return incentive schemes, which may include tax exemptions, relocation grants, or scholarship designs that are conditional upon return after graduation.
The report closes with a foresight analysis of the state of intra-EU mobility by 2030. This exercise identifies the best- and worst-case scenarios of degree mobility in Europe. In the proposed worst-case scenario, mobility is only available to elites due to high costs and is limited to certain geopolitically ‘safe’ environments. The report claims that even in an optimal future, mobility is expanded but remains somewhat territorially unbalanced across countries. This shows that balanced mobility does not happen automatically and instead needs to be designed by policymakers. Potential levers include the active steering of mobility destinations, for example by incentivising students through Erasmus+ grants to explore less popular destinations, or an EU talent circulation toolbox that would offer structured return support and digital tracking of graduates.
As countries like Switzerland continuously develop their engagement in the EU talent circulation pool, the study offers important insights into how opening borders for additional mobility can have net-positive effects for countries.