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What happened to Sweden?A data-driven storyChapter 4 of 61990–2025

Long-run outcomes — an overview

What were the consequences?

An editorial overview of the long-run outcomes: work, economy, municipalities, schools, crime, segregation and the second generation.

read time
14 min read
charts
7
primary sources
12

After this chapter you will understand

  • Why the same immigration volume can produce very different consequences.
  • What research actually shows about work, finances, schools, crime and segregation.
  • How the second generation has developed — and where the gap persists.
  • What is established, what is uncertain and what is political interpretation.

Why do the consequences look so different?

The same immigration volume can produce very different outcomes. What matters is not the number of people — it is the composition and the structures around them. Six factors explain most of the variance between cohorts, municipalities and neighbourhoods.

  • 01

    Migration category

    Labour vs asylum vs family — very different starting points.

  • 02

    Education level

    Share with tertiary education ranges from 20 % to 86 %.

  • 03

    Labour-market cycle

    Cohorts arriving in a boom establish faster.

  • 04

    Municipality

    Reception volume and local labour market vary sharply.

  • 05

    Neighbourhood

    Segregation and crowding affect school outcomes and safety.

  • 06

    Time in Sweden

    Employment rises; the native gap narrows but rarely closes fully.

This chapter walks through the consequences area by area. Deeper analysis, metrics and time series live on the in-depth pages linked from each section.

How to read this

Every claim is tagged by the type of evidence: observation (official statistics), statistical correlation (controlled or not), research (peer-reviewed or agency reports) and political interpretation (opinion — clearly marked).

Work and self-sufficiency

Employment is the single most important factor behind the whole chain of consequences: tax revenue, welfare dependency, housing, trust and second-generation outcomes. Without work the chain breaks early.

Observation

Labour migrants reach 86 % employment after five years. Refugees reach 15 % after two years and 58 % only after ten years. Source: Statistics Sweden STATIV.

  • Labour migrants86%
  • EU/EEA citizens78%
  • Family of labour66%
  • Family of refugees46%
  • Refugees (10+ years)58%
  • Refugees (2 years)15%
  • Native-born (reference)84%
Employment rate by migration ground, most recent cohorts. Source: Statistics Sweden STATIV.
Research

Establishment time has not improved despite increased spending. The 2010 Establishment Mission has not shortened the average time to first job. Source: IFAU and the Swedish National Audit Office.

Public finances

The debate about the fiscal cost of migration is often confused because different studies measure different things. GDP and GDP per capita are not the same. Public revenue and public expenditure are separate sides. Cross-sections and life-cycle models answer different questions. All three matter — but only when the method is disclosed.

Ruist (2015)

Method
Cross-section · all foreign-born
Scope
Average foreign-born, per year
Result
−58,000 kr

Aldén & Hammarstedt (2019)

Method
Lifetime cohort · refugees 1980–2015
Scope
Lifetime, per individual
Result
−1,900,000 kr

ESO 2018:3 (Flood/Ruist)

Method
Life-cycle model · by ground
Scope
Lifetime, per individual, weighted average
Result
−600,000 kr
The methods give different answers. Lifetime models account for pensions, health care and tax progression; cross-sections do not. No study is definitive.
Research

Foreign-born residents as a group contribute less than they cost during their first decades in Sweden. The size of the net cost depends strongly on ground for residence, age at arrival and education. Ruist 2015; Aldén & Hammarstedt 2019; ESO 2018:3.

Statistical correlation

Aggregate GDP has grown with the population, but GDP per capita has stagnated since 2018. The correlation is not purely migration — productivity and the employment gap both matter. Source: Statistics Sweden National Accounts.

The municipalities

National averages hide the fact that municipalities carry most of the practical consequences. The gap between Danderyd and Filipstad is wider than the gap between Sweden and Denmark.

Observation

133 of Sweden's 290 municipalities had a negative result in 2024. Municipalities with high refugee reception have on average lower tax capacity and higher welfare payments per inhabitant. Source: SKR and Statistics Sweden.

Statistical correlation

The share of welfare payments correlates strongly with the share of foreign-born in a municipality — but is not fully explained by it. Education, labour market and time in Sweden carry most of the effect. Source: Socialstyrelsen; SCB.

School

School results are the clearest early signal on whether integration works. A careful reading is needed: gaps between groups reflect much more than origin — age at arrival, parental education and the school's socioeconomic profile all matter.

OECD 476Native, native background493Native, foreign background460Arrived before age 6448Arrived 6–11405Arrived 12+358

PISA reading literacy 2022 by age at arrival, score (OECD average 476)

  • Native, native background: 493; Native, foreign background: 460; Arrived before age 6: 448; Arrived 6–11: 405; Arrived 12+: 358
PISA 2022, reading literacy, grade 9 students. Source: Swedish National Agency for Education.
Observation

The share of pupils leaving Year 9 without upper-secondary eligibility was 16 % in 2024 — the highest level since measurement began. The gap between native and foreign background is large but narrows with years spent in Sweden. Source: Skolverket.

Research

School segregation has increased since the 1992 free-school reform. Researchers agree on the increase; they disagree on how much of the outcome gap it explains. Source: IFAU, Skolverket, OECD.

Crime and safety

This section is kept strictly factual. The statistics show clear differences between groups — but they also show that the differences narrow when controlling for age, sex and socioeconomic background, without disappearing entirely. Skipping the controls is misleading; controlling them all away is too.

Foreign-born

Uncontrolled
2.5×
After controls for age, sex, socioeconomics
1.6×

Native, two foreign-born parents

Uncontrolled
3.2×
After controls for age, sex, socioeconomics
2.0×

Native, one foreign-born parent

Uncontrolled
1.5×
After controls for age, sex, socioeconomics
1.2×

Reference: native-born, two native-born parents

Uncontrolled
1,0×
After controls for age, sex, socioeconomics
1,0×
Relative risk of being registered as a crime suspect. Source: Brå 2021:9. Controlling for age, sex and socioeconomic background reduces — but does not eliminate — the differences.
Research

The relative risk of being registered as a suspect is about 2.5× for foreign-born and 3.2× for native-born with two foreign-born parents. After controlling for age, sex and socioeconomic factors, about 1.6× and 2.0× remain. Source: Brå 2021:9.

Observation

Fatal shootings peaked at 63 in 2022 — the highest per-capita in the EU — and have since halved to 32 in 2024 and continued downwards in 2025. Bombings peaked at 149 detonations in 2023 with a new record in 2024, and have fallen sharply in the first half of 2026. Source: Police; Brå.

Political interpretation

Whether this should be read as an integration crisis, a recruitment crisis in vulnerable areas, or an effect of the structure of the drug market is a political and analytical question where researchers disagree.

Segregation

Segregation is the geographical side of everything above. Housing segregation, socioeconomic segregation and school segregation reinforce each other across generations.

0204060201553201761201960202161202359202559

Number of vulnerable and particularly vulnerable areas per year

  • Vulnerable areas (total): 2015: 53; 2017: 61; 2019: 60; 2021: 61; 2023: 59; 2025: 59
  • Particularly vulnerable: 2015: 15; 2017: 23; 2019: 22; 2021: 19; 2023: 17; 2025: 15
Vulnerable areas (total)Particularly vulnerable
Source: Swedish Police NOA, situational reports on vulnerable areas 2015–2025.
Observation

The number of vulnerable areas stayed around 59–61 between 2017 and 2023 and rose to 65 in the 2025 assessment. The number of particularly vulnerable areas has fallen from 23 (2017) to 19 (2025). The 2025 assessment dropped the risk-area category, which makes levels before and after 2023 only partly comparable. Source: Swedish Police NOA.

Research

Overcrowding is about four times higher in vulnerable areas than in the rest of the country. The share of children growing up in crowded housing affects school outcomes, health and crime risk. Source: Boverket; Public Health Agency.

The chapter's core question

The second generation

The second generation — children born in Sweden to foreign-born parents — is the decisive yardstick. If outcomes converge towards native background, the system has worked. If they get stuck between the first generation and native background, that points to structural barriers. The picture is mixed.

Upper-secondary eligibility, Y9

Gen 1
0.62
Gen 2
0.86
Native background
1.00
Trend
→ converging

Employment 25–34

Gen 1
0.72
Gen 2
0.90
Native background
1.00
Trend
→ converging

Median income 30–39

Gen 1
0.71
Gen 2
0.86
Native background
1.00
Trend
→ converging

Welfare dependency

Gen 1
2.80
Gen 2
1.70
Native background
1.00
Trend
→ converging
Outcomes as ratio to native background (=1). Welfare dependency is inverted — lower is better. Source: Statistics Sweden STATIV, Skolverket.
Observation

The second generation consistently outperforms the first on school, employment and income — but does not reach the native background level. Employment is about 10 percentage points lower; median income about 14 % lower; welfare dependency nearly twice as high. Source: Statistics Sweden STATIV.

Research

Convergence is stronger for pupils with parents from Europe and East Asia, weaker for pupils with parents from the Middle East and Africa. This holds after controlling for parental education. Source: Rooth & Ekberg, IFAU reports.

Political interpretation

Whether the remaining gap is due to discrimination, cultural distance, housing segregation, the school choice system, or a combination — this is where researchers do not agree. This is the chapter's most important open question.

Summary

What is established, what is uncertain, what is politics?

Well established

  • Establishment takes long and varies sharply by ground.
  • Foreign-born are on average a fiscal net cost in the first decades.
  • Municipalities carry the largest practical burden.
  • Vulnerable areas remain stable around 60.
  • The second generation converges but does not reach native levels.

Uncertain

  • The exact size of the lifetime net cost per ground.
  • How much of the school outcome gap is explained by segregation.
  • Whether the 2024–2026 decline in shootings is sustained.
  • Why convergence differs across origin regions.

Political interpretation

  • Is the net cost "too high" — compared to what?
  • Who bears responsibility for the remaining gap?
  • Which policy measures should be prioritised.

The next chapter — What drove the change? — takes these outcomes and asks which factors in the system determined that this became the result.

Primary sources

Sources in this chapter

Updated 2026-07-20.

Summary

Key takeaways

  • Consequences vary more with composition than with total volume.
  • Establishment takes long and varies sharply by migration ground.
  • Life-cycle studies indicate a fiscal net cost in the first decades; the size depends on method.
  • Municipalities carry the largest practical burden; national averages hide the local reality.
  • Differences in school outcomes and crime statistics narrow but do not disappear after controls.
  • Vulnerable areas have been stable around 60 since 2017; particularly vulnerable have decreased.
  • The second generation converges towards native background — but does not reach it.

Further reading

Sources for this page

The data comes from official primary sources.

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  author       = {Sverigefakta.com},
  title        = {Sverigefakta},
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  note         = {Dataset v2026.2, accessed 2026-09-12}
}
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