Use of Public Social Services by Retirement Migrants in Spain

This paper presents the first results of a research Project on the relationship between retirement migrants and public Social Services in Spain (funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science) that aims to: a) get to know the extent to which European retirees living in Spain make use of public Social Services and benefits; b) identify the circumstances in which they would come into contact with the Social Services (dependency, lack of resources, economic crisis, return assistance); c) understand the challenges that these new users pose to social workers; d) identify and evaluate the strategies developed by said workers to assist them. To fulfill these aims we have a mixed methods design including more than 300 phone interviews with Social Services coordinators (covering all municipalities where more than 30% of elderly residents have a non-Spanish nationality); in-depth case studies in five destination places; and an online survey distributed to all social workers in destination areas. Phone interviews will be completed by March 2020, and in our presentation we will show, for the first time, an exhaustive quantitative panorama of the relationship between retirement migrants and public social services across all Spanish destination areas. We will look for and try to explain patterns in this relationship at the macro and micro levels. I.e.: why retirement migrants use public Social Services more on certain areas? And what characteristics of the individuals foster or depress their reliance on public social services when they are in need? This quantitative panorama will be enriched and qualified with results from the case studies, which will be in process by the time of the Conference.