WB: Romanians prefer to move to other Romanian cities, than emigrate

Around 3.6 million Romanians are planning to change their residence in the upcoming five years, and 66.5 percent of them would prefer to stay in Romania, a report by the Word Bank shows. This shows, for the first time, a trend reversal, as in the past years most Romanians who were planning to change residence would prefer to go abroad.

Most of those who plan to change residence, 65.5 percent, said would prefer to move in Romania, while 31.3 percent, 1.1 million, said they would prefer to move abroad. According to the report, Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara and Brasov are the most popular cities among those questioned. The 18 percent of respondents who showed interest in changing residence had a certainty rate of 85 percent. The rest of participants in the WB survey said they had not planned to move in the upcoming five years.

Most of those who showed a willingness to change residence are young, with an average age of 35. Also, most of the respondents who are planning to move, namely 75 percent, do not have children. Out of the 25 percent that do have children, most have one child only.

Most of the respondents who are planning to change residence are highly educated, bigger than average incomes and work in the private sector. Inhabitants in the less developed areas, such as southern Wallachia, as well as the north east of Romania are more likely to change residence than those in the more developed regions, such as west and center.