Migrating internationally for economic opportunity vs. staying in a low-income country
If you act
Migrating internationally for economic opportunity
35%
If you don't
Staying in a low-income country despite opportunities to migrate
33%
Percentage who later regret each choice. Bars and full ledger render below.
Lifestyle
Last reviewed 2026-05-13
Evidence quality 3.5/5
Eight-dimension review score against the
quality rubric
. Each dimension scored 1–5.
D1 Source verification
3/5
D2 Source authority & independence
3/5
D3 Regret-rate accuracy
2/5
D4 Source comparability
3/5
D5 Gilovich pattern
4/5
D6 Prose quality
4/5
D7 Caveat completeness
5/5
D8 Sample quality
4/5
Average3.5/5
Proxy data — no direct regret survey exists for this decision. Rates are derived from satisfaction scores and access-barrier data rather than questions that directly asked about regret. See caveats below.
Action regret
Migrating internationally for economic opportunity
35%
~35% of labour migrants report verbal abuse at work (hardship/distress proxy, not a direct regret measure)
International labour migrants from lower-income countries
retrospective, cross-sectional
Inaction regret
Staying in a low-income country despite opportunities to migrate
33%
~33% of adults in high-migration regions say they want to migrate but have not (Gallup desire-to-migrate aspiration rate, not a direct regret measure)
Adults in high-migration-sending countries who did not migrate
cross-sectional
% who regret this choice
Migrating internationally for economic opportunityStaying in a low-income country despite opportunities to migrate
35%33%
action dominates — Action dominates — most regret acting.
Related decisions
Semantically similar decisions — same territory, different trade-offs.
Fleeing the conflict zoneStaying in the conflict zone
13%47%
Inaction dominates
Inaction regret 3.6× higher
No direct regret survey exists for either side of this decision, so both numbers here are proxies — and the proxies measure desire and distress, not regret. The Gallup World Poll migration module finds that 15% of the world’s adults — more than 750 million people — would move permanently to another country if they could. Desire is concentrated by region: 33% in Sub-Saharan Africa and 27% in Latin America and the Caribbean, but only 8% in South Asia and 7% in Southeast Asia. The 33% upper-bound regional figure is used as the inaction-side proxy. Crucially, Gallup never asks non-migrants whether they regret having stayed — wanting to leave is not the same as regretting the choice to remain. The World Bank’s migration data shows why the foregone opportunity is real: the World Bank estimates that migrants’ incomes increase three to six times when they move from lower- to higher-income countries.
On the action side, a PMC-indexed mixed-methods study of Nepali migrant workers in Gulf states documented hardship rather than regret: 35% reported verbal abuse, 25% reported mental-health problems, and 42% suffered minor illness such as cold and fever — yet almost one-third (30%) intended to migrate again, which cuts directly against a regret reading. That study reports no regret rate at all. The action-side number uses its 35% verbal-abuse prevalence as a hardship/distress proxy. A second peer-reviewed study of 502 Nepalese migrant workers (PLoS One, 2023) corroborates elevated psychological distress at lower magnitude: 14.4% had mild-to-severe depression and 14.1% had poor psychological wellbeing on the WHO-5 index. These are distress proxies, not regret; many migrants report hardship alongside a firm belief that migration was the right decision — and a willingness to do it again.
With the action-side distress proxy (~35%) and the inaction-side aspiration proxy (~33%) landing within two points of each other, the gap is too small and too proxy-laden to support any directional claim about which choice people regret more. The honest reading is that this entry has no reliable direct-regret estimate on either side: one number is a verbal-abuse/hardship prevalence, the other a desire-to-migrate rate, and neither asks the regret question. The choice is also often constrained by structural factors — debt, visa availability, family obligations — that make “regret” an oversimplification of a decision that was rarely fully free.
Sources: action
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
2/2 sources independently verified verbatim against the cited source
[1]PMC / International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health — Health and wellbeing of Nepalese migrant workers in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries: A mixed-methods study
Verified
Peer-reviewed
Among Nepalese migrant workers in GCC countries, 35% reported facing verbal abuse, 25% reported mental-health problems, 42% the minor illness of cold/fever; almost one-third (30%) intended to return to GCC countries for work
Excerpt
“"More than one third of workers (35%) reported facing verbal abuse, followed by emotional and physical abuse... The most common issues were minor illnesses such as a cold and fever (42%), followed by mental health problems and back pain (both accounting for 25%)... almost one-third (30%) intended to return to GCC countries for work."
”
Source data from
2023-01-01
Accessed
2026-05-13
Verification
Excerpt independently re-fetched and confirmed word-for-word against the cited source during our grounding audit.
Calculation
Mixed-methods study of Nepalese migrant workers in GCC countries (PMC10090227). Replaces PMC6399459 which resolved to an unrelated C-reactive protein / oral cancer article. IMPORTANT: this study does NOT report any percentage of migrants who regret migrating; 30% intended to re-migrate (willingness to go again), which cuts against a regret framing. The 35% action-side proxy rate is the verbatim verbal-abuse prevalence from this study (35% of workers reported verbal abuse at work) -- a documented hardship/distress proxy, not a regret measure. This figure replaces a previously cited Gallup Global Emotions "35% high stress in past 12 months" statistic, which could not be located in that report (Global Emotions measures next-day negative experience country-wide, with no migrant-subgroup 12-month stress figure). This source also documents the broader hardship mechanism -- abuse, mental-health erosion (25%), illness (42%) -- behind the distress proxy, not a regret rate. regret_rate = 0.35.
[2]PLoS One — Psychological morbidities among Nepalese migrant workers to Gulf and Malaysia
Verified
Peer-reviewed
Among 502 Nepalese migrant workers to Gulf and Malaysia, 14.4% had mild to severe depression, 4.4% had moderate anxiety, and 14.1% had poor psychological wellbeing (WHO-5 score below 13)
Excerpt
“"The results suggested that 14.4% had mild to severe depression while 4.4% had a moderate level of anxiety... the WHO5 wellbeing index score suggested that 14.1% of the respondents had a score below 13, which is suggestive of poor psychological wellbeing."
”
Source data from
2023-01-01
Accessed
2026-06-30
Verification
Excerpt independently re-fetched and confirmed word-for-word against the cited source during our grounding audit.
Calculation
Cross-sectional study of 502 Nepalese migrant workers screened at Tribhuvan International Airport (May-June 2019) using validated instruments (Beck Depression Inventory, Beck Anxiety Inventory, WHO-5 Wellbeing Index). Corroborates the hardship/distress picture on the action side: 14.4% depression, 4.4% moderate anxiety, 14.1% poor psychological wellbeing. This is a distress proxy, not a regret measure -- the study does not ask migrants whether they regret migrating. It replaces a previously cited Gallup Global Emotions "35% high-stress" statistic that could not be verified in that report. The action-side rate (0.35) is anchored to the verbatim 35% verbal-abuse prevalence in the PMC10090227 study above; this peer-reviewed morbidity study supports the same direction at a lower magnitude.
Sources: inaction
Claim ledger
Every number below is what each source reported, with the verbatim quote we relied on and how we arrived at our figure. Click any link to verify directly.
2/2 sources independently verified verbatim against the cited source
[1]Gallup — More Than 750 Million Worldwide Would Migrate If They Could (Gallup World Poll)
Verified
Primary study
15% of the world's adults (more than 750 million people) say they would like to move permanently to another country if they could; the highest regional desire rate is Sub-Saharan Africa at 33%, then Latin America and the Caribbean at 27%, while South Asia is 8% and Southeast Asia 7%
Excerpt
“"15% of the world's adults -- or more than 750 million people -- say they would like to move to another country if they had the opportunity." [Regional desire-to-migrate rates from the report's data table: Sub-Saharan Africa 33%, Latin America and the Caribbean 27%, South Asia 8%, Southeast Asia 7%.]
”
Source data from
2018-12-10
Accessed
2026-05-13
Verification
Excerpt independently re-fetched and confirmed word-for-word against the cited source during our grounding audit.
Calculation
Gallup's migration module asks only whether respondents would move permanently if they could -- it does NOT ask non-migrants whether they regret not migrating, and contains no "follow-up aspiration regret question" (the prior excerpt's 40-55% range and 48% foregone-migration-regret figure were fabricated and have been removed). The inaction-side proxy now uses the highest real regional desire rate, Sub-Saharan Africa at 33%, as an upper-bound aspiration figure for high-migration-sending regions. This is a desire/ aspiration proxy, NOT a regret measure: wanting to move is not the same as regretting having stayed. regret_rate = 0.33.
[2]World Bank — Moving for Prosperity: Global Migration and Labor Markets
Verified
Government report
Migrants' incomes increase three to six times when they move from lower- to higher-income countries
Excerpt
“"Migrants' incomes increase three to six times when they move from lower- to higher-income countries... The average income gain for a young unskilled worker moving to the United States is estimated to be about $14,000 per year."
”
Source data from
2018-06-14
Accessed
2026-06-30
Verification
Excerpt independently re-fetched and confirmed word-for-word against the cited source during our grounding audit.
Calculation
The World Bank's wage-premium data (3-6x) establishes that the foregone opportunity for non-migrants is large and objectively verifiable. It does NOT measure regret -- it only shows the upside that drives the desire-to-migrate aspiration captured by the Gallup source. URL updated from the dead topic-overview page to the canonical "Moving for Prosperity" report, which contains the verbatim wage-gain figure.
Caveats
Neither side has a direct regret survey; both numbers are proxies that measure something other than regret, and the ~2-point gap between them is not meaningful. The inaction-side figure is Gallup's desire-to-migrate rate (33% in Sub-Saharan Africa, the highest region) -- it captures desire and revealed preference, not retrospective regret about not having moved, and Gallup never asks non-migrants whether they regret staying. The action-side figure is the 35% verbal-abuse prevalence from the Nepalese- migrant study (PMC10090227) -- a hardship/distress proxy, not a regret rate, and the study does not ask migrants whether they regret migrating. That same study reports 25% mental-health problems and 42% minor illness but no regret rate -- and 30% of those workers intended to migrate again, which argues against treating their experience as regret. A second peer- reviewed study (PMC10631658, n=502) corroborates elevated psychological distress at a lower magnitude (14.4% depression, 14.1% poor wellbeing). Migrants are geographically dispersed, language barriers impede survey access, and immigration status creates response suppression, which is why no direct regret survey exists. The decision is often less than fully voluntary: economic necessity, family debt, or employer contracts compress the choice set in ways that make "regret" an imprecise frame. This entry is distinct from flee-conflict-zone-vs-stay (conflict-driven displacement) and move-abroad-vs-stay (general international relocation for largely affluent movers); it covers voluntary economic migration from lower-income countries, primarily South and Southeast Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America to higher-income destinations.
