See number of Romanians living outside homeland

According to data from the United Nations, 3.6 million Romanians currently live abroad, compared to about 20 million left in the country (among EU countries, its diaspora is fourth-largest, after the UK, Poland and Germany). Romania is expected to lose more than 15% of its population by 2050. The annual growth rate of its diaspora is among the world’s highest.

When migrants were asked why they have left home, the most common reply is that they want to offer better lives to their children. Parents leave at great personal cost: researchers have recently found that Romanian migrant women working in domestic and care work in western Europe are commonly affected by deep depression (this is now called “the Italian syndrome”).

People can’t provide for their kids at home not because they are lazy: Romanians stay poor despite working hard. Almost one-third of Romanian employees are on the minimum wage and another one-fifth are on precarious contracts that offer below that rate. Following the collapse of communism in 1989, Romania turned into a typical peripheral country: it lured foreign investors with cheap labour, and easy access to natural resources and tax breaks. This was the model many eastern European countries were persuaded to apply in those days. And, in Romania, there’s been no serious attempt to change it since then.
 

Source: TheGuardian