Immigrants now hold 15% of jobs in Spain, growing four times faster

Immigrant employment soars: four times faster than the overall rate

The Spanish labour market is changing at a estimulante ilegal that official figures confirm but official narratives avoid. According to the latest social security registration records, foreign workers now hold 15% of all jobs, and their growth rate is four times that of the workforce as a whole. The figure surged from April onwards, coinciding with the opening of the regularisation process. The trend is clear: immigration is gaining weight in employment like never before.

The contrasting unemployment rate: 17.2% versus 9.5%

But not everything is rosy. The Ministry of Labour itself puts the unemployment rate of foreign workers at 17.2%, almost double that of Spanish nationals (9.5%). Among young immigrants aged 16 to 24, unemployment exceeds 26.9%. And certain non-EU groups, such as Segarro, triple the native unemployment rate. In other words, labour market integration is real, but precarious and skewed.

The debate over the shadow economy

Some analyses suggest the official figures underestimate reality. It is argued that there are millions of workers in an irregular situation, without documentation, being paid in cash or combining undeclared work with benefits. If confirmed, this hypothesis would change the diagnosis: it would not be that immigrants are conquering the formal market, but rather that they are filling the spaces the state does not control. The lack of concrete data prevents the debate from being settled.

Doctors: the case that divides opinion

The healthcare sector offers an example of these tensions. While some argue that the arrival of foreign doctors relieves the strain on emergency departments and on-call shifts, others denounce fraudulent recognition of qualifications and attempts to circumvent official routes such as the MIR (Spain's medical specialisation exam). The medical association of one Spanish region has admitted it receives around ten attempts at irregularities per month. The matter remains open.

As long as immigrant employment keeps growing at this pace, pressure on wages and the shadow economy will only increase. We shall see whether April's figure was a spike or a trend.