Where will the French live? Thanks to successive studies by the National Institute of Statistics (INSEE), it is possible to follow the evolution of population movements within the national territory. And precisely, the organization recently looked at the pivotal period of 2020 to establish whether the health crisis and the democratization of telework that resulted from it had an impact on these migratory movements.

A trend that continues

This study, published in March, tells us that while the pandemic has increased the number of trips, they have been carried out in line with the trends observed over the past decade.

Thus, France Island has been the region with the most departures for many years. And the first lockdown only amplified the phenomenon since nearly 10% of Parisians left the capital (208,000 residents).

And even after the return to normal, the region recorded only 35 household arrivals from other territories for every 100 departures in 2022. The trend is similar in Hauts-de-France and Grand-Est, which show more departures of inhabitants than arrivals in 2019 as in 2022.

Conversely, INSEE notes that the regions that were the most attractive before the health crisis, remained so after it: Brittany, Corsica, Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Occitanie and Pays-de-la-Loire thus appear to be the most popular territories for the French, in 2019 as in 2022.

Heading for the periphery

Faced with the cost of real estate but also the expectations of households in terms of quality of life, comfort, access to green spaces, etc., we have observed for years an urban sprawl that leads the French to leave large cities to settle on the outskirts.

Between 2017 and 2019, there were more than 2 entries into the crown of areas of 700,000 inhabitants or more from their pole, for only one exit towards the same pole. And in 2021, this ratio climbs to 2.68, before falling back to 2.49 in 2022. Here again, the trend is increasing.

But it is mainly medium-sized and small cities that attract households. INSEE explains that "in the catchment areas of cities with fewer than 200,000 inhabitants, which benefited from surplus flows before 2020, the ratio between entries and exits is increasing; in 2021, for example, the Colmar and Vannes areas receive respectively 122 and 110 incoming mail transfers for every 100 outgoing mail transfers. »

Teleworking, a new driver of travel

Finally, INSEE estimates that "it is in the departments where jobs appear most compatible with teleworking that the ratio of entries to exits has fallen the most between 2018 and 2021".

OUR "DEMOGRAPHY" DOSSIER

Île-de-France, but also the departments of Rhône and Haute-Garonne are the first to be mentioned, knowing that metropolitan functions and office jobs are over-represented. When they can telework, workers no longer hesitate to change territory.

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