Emigration moods of modern Ukrainians caused by economic problems and a sense of self-restraint (on survey data from the South of Ukraine)

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Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University Mykolaiv

Emigration moods of modern Ukrainians caused by economic problems and a sense of self-restraint (on survey data from the South of Ukraine)

Liudmyla Kalashnikova, Viktoriia Chorna, Arthur Fesenko

Анотація

ЕМІГРАЦІЙНІ НАСТРОЇ СУЧАСНИХ УКРАЇНЦІВ, СПРИЧИНЕНІ ЕКОНОМІЧНИМИ НЕГАРАЗДАМИ ТА ВІДЧУТТЯМ САМООБМЕЖЕННЯ (ЗА МАТЕРІАЛАМИ ПІВДНЯ УКРАЇНИ)

Людмила Калашнікова кандидат соціологічних наук, доцент; e-mail: lvkalashnikova198@ gmail.com, Вікторія Чорна кандидат соціологічних наук, доцент; e-mail: chornav2008@gmail.com, Артур Фесенко кандидат історичних наук, доцент

Чорноморський національний університет імені Петра Могили м. Миколаїв

У цій статті розглядається проблема поширення еміграційних настроїв серед сучасних українців, спричинена стійким відчуттям власної економічної неблагополуччя та відсутністю надії на покращення рівня життя найближчим часом. Тезові настрої дозволяють оцінити ситуацію в категоріях поняття «деривація» бідності: саме відчуття такої обмеженості (депривація) є провідним фактором відштовхування великої кількості українців за кордон, до більш процвітаючих країн у соціально-економічні умови, особливо західні. В рамках цього підходу ми проаналізували результати спеціального анкетного опитування жителів трьох обласних центрів (Одеси, Миколаєва, Херсона), проведеного провідними соціологами Півдня України. Опитування показало, як мешканці оцінюють свій рівень життя на території сучасного Півдня України, його перспективи покращення самооцінки населення та еміграційні настрої, що характеризують зазначені умови життя (результати представлені регіональними, міськими та регіональними вікові розподіли). Дослідження показало, що значна частина жителів півдня України справді характеризує економічний добробут своїх сімей як недостатній з огляду на вимоги до якості життя сучасних цивілізованих людей, а також висловлює сумнів щодо покращення рівня їхнього добробуту в майбутньому. Не впевнені у завтрашньому дні, більше половини респондентів зазначили, що розглядають можливість переїзду на постійне місце проживання, причому перевага віддається західному світу, який зараз широко асоціюється з багатством та комфортом життя з точки зору конкретних міграційних орієнтацій.

Ключові слова: південь України; самооцінка населення; економічний стан; життєві перспективи; добробут; бідність; еміграційні настрої; наміри еміграції; еміграційні орієнтації.

Abstract

This article deals with the problem of spreading emigration moods among modern Ukrainians, caused by a stable sense of their own economic disadvantage and lack of hope for improving the standard of living in the nearest future. Theses moods allow us to evaluate the situation in the categories of "deprivation" concept of poverty: it is the feeling of such limitations (deprivation) is a leading factor in pushing a large number of Ukrainians abroad, to the more prosperous countries in socio-economic terms, especially Western ones. Within the framework of this approach we analyzed the results of a special questionnaire survey of residents of three regional centers (Odessa, Mykolaiv, Kherson), conducted by leading sociologists of the South of Ukraine. The survey showed how residents evaluated their standard of living in the territory of the modern South of Ukraine, its prospects for improvement self-esteem of the population and the emigration moods which characterize the specified conditions of life (results are presented by regional, city and age distributions). The study showed that a considerable part of the inhabitants of southern Ukraine really characterized the economic well-being of their families as insufficient in view of the quality of life requirements of the modern civilized people and also expressed doubts about the improvement of the level of their well-being in the future. Unsure about tomorrow, more than half of survey respondents indicated that they were considering moving to a permanent place of residence, with preference given to the Western world, which is now widely associated with wealth and living comfort, in terms of specific migration orientations.

Key words: south of Ukraine; self-esteem of the population; economic status; life prospects; welfare; poverty; emigration moods; emigration intentions; emigration orientations.

Introduction

Mass surveys, including monitoring, conducted recently by leading domestic sociological institutions, indicate a significant level of economic pessimism among the Ukrainian population, which is reflected in their critical attitude to their standard of living, financial well-being of their families, fear of permanent increase in prices and unemployment threat as well as fear of "sudden impoverishment” due to probable force majeure in the family or in the state. The same poll reveals that Ukrainians, demonstrating dissatisfaction with their standard of living and quality of life, are even more critical in assessing the overall situation on the whole and "direction of movement” of the country.

Thus, according to the January 2017 sampling survey of 10.6 million Ukrainian households (including those with employed people and not only disabled) only 7% said that their income was sufficient for both current consumption and savings. On the other hand, half of the household income was only enough for current consumption; 40% of the respondents indicated that they were constantly giving up everything but the most necessary expenses, and 69% classified themselves as poor; finally, none of the respondents described themselves as rich Доброва Т.Г. (2018). Бідність працюючого населення як індикатор соціально-економічного стану суспільства. Економіка і суспільство. № 14. С. 689..

Leading sociologists of Ukraine (in particular, M. Shulga in the book “The failure of the social matrix”, published recently by the Institute of Sociology of the NAS of Ukraine), qualify the state of consciousness, generated by the unfavorable economic condition and the resulting sense of self-restraint, as a crisis. Many years ago I. Popova emphasized that crisis consciousness “is characterized by such features as anxiety, worries, fear, anomie, and uncertainty about tomorrow, a pessimistic perception of reality, clearly and implicitly expressed”. Now experts state that “the public consciousness is permeated with anxiety, worries, hopelessness, dissatisfaction”, and “the moods of pessimism, hopelessness associated with the collapse of hopes, ideas, and plans” are typical Шульга М. (2018). Збій соціальної матриці: монографія. Київ: Інститут соціології НАН України. С. 204, 215..

These moods are the basis for not only dissatisfaction with one's own life and state of affairs in the country as a whole, but also plans to foreign migration sentiments and practices abroad. Ukraine has recently experienced the times of a real surge of “work” and full-fledged emigration. Moreover, young generation of Ukrainians are increasingly involved into the so-called “educational migration”, focused on the admission and study in foreign universities, and, again, with the prospects for building life outside their homeland.

According to experts, in particular the director of the Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research of the NAS of Ukraine E. Libanova, the main factor of external migration in the modern world is resettlement because of economic reasons. “The main role is played by the quality of life ratio in countries (regions, settlements) of origin (residence) and countries (regions, settlements) of destination, resulting in the fact that “mass migration flows always moving from a country (region, settlement) with a lower quality of life to where the quality of life is higher”. As for Ukrainians, they “seek not only higher earnings (although this is the most important factor), but also a peaceful, stable life in places with safe environment, affordable medicine, good roads and transport, clean streets and yards” Аксьонова С.Ю., Антонюк В.П., Банчук О.А. та ін. (2018). Українське суспільство: міграційний вимір: нац. доповідь. Київ: Інститут демографії та соціальних досліджень ім. М.В. Птухи НАН України. С. 9..

This fact is emphasized in the National report “Ukrainian society: the migration dimension” of Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research of the NAS of Ukraine, developed under supervision of E. Libanova, where it is noted that “realized and to a certain extent potential emigration directions are the most complete and accurate reflection of the following moods:

- low assessment of their own life and current situation in the country in the absence of belief in rapid changes that will lead to the desired results (53.5% of those who are planning to leave Ukraine are convinced that there will be no improvement and only 16.0% believe that everything will work out); poor prospects for themselves, family and offspring in Ukraine;

- persistent belief in a higher quality of life in other countries / regions and confidence in the demand for labor (or vocational education) for migrants in destination countries;

- confidence in their ability to integrate into a new society (find work, shelter, learn the language, adapt to lifestyles, etc.), in particular via inter-territorial relations and experience of family, neighborhood and community migration;

- spread of the guidelines for emigration in society (living, labor, educational) and formation of a peculiar fashion for emigration, especially among the educated population;

- the transformation of migration in the imagination of a large part of Ukrainians to an effective social elevator allowing a significant raise of material and social status Там само. С. 10..

Thus, the very idea of leaving is provoked by people's life discomfort, life disorder; thoughts about emigration become “a psychological reaction to the hopelessness, the loss of life prospects” Шульга Н.А. (2011). Дрейф на обочину. Двадцать лет общественных изменений в Украине: монография. Киев: Бізнесполіграф. С. 378..

The prevalence of migration sentiments among Ukrainians is evidenced by data from monitoring surveys conducted by the Institute of Sociology of the NAS of Ukraine. In 2014, 15% of the surveyed residents of Ukraine seriously considered emigration, and more than 21% did it in 2016; plans to go abroad for temporary employment were built by 7% in 2014 and 11% in 2016, while the number of those who had work experience abroad increased from 17% to 20% in these two years. As the leading reason for their employment emigration, 84% of the surveyed workers noted a low level of wages in Ukraine: the average monthly wages of one labor migrant (at the time of the survey) was $ 722, which was 3.5 times higher than the average salary in Ukraine which was $ 203 Доброва Т.Г. (2018). Бідність працюючого населення як індикатор соціально-економічного стану суспільства. Економіка і суспільство. № 14. С. 691-692.. According to another survey conducted by the poll group “Rating”, 27% of respondents wanted to leave Ukraine, and most of them were Ukrainians aged from 18 to 25 years (52%), with higher education (34%), with average well-being (36%), and 22% with low well-being responded that they wanted to live abroad Поїхати чи залишитися: скільки українців хочуть жити за кордоном. URL: https:// www.slovoidilo.ua/2018/03/16/mfografika/suspilstvo/poyixaty-chy-zalyshytysya-skilky- ukrayincziv-xochut-zhyty-kordonom.

All these indicators prove the relevance and urgency of the outlined problems for modern Ukraine, symptomatic, among other things, of negative mental shifts in the mass consciousness of Ukrainians. The prevalence of pessimistic and “suitcase” moods, especially in the youth environment and among educated people of work age is a challenge that hinders Ukraine's course on a modern European-style society.

Over the last decades, monitoring studies of the standard of living and migration activity of the Ukrainian population have been carried out under the auspices of such powerful scientific institutions of Ukraine as the Institute of Sociology of the NAS of Ukraine, Ptukha Institute of Demography and Social Research of the NAS of Ukraine, Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, etc., whose staff regularly present the significant results of relevant surveys and other studies to the scientists and common people.

E. Libanova, L. Cherenko, O. Makarova, O. Paliy, Yu. Sayenko, V. Butkaliuk and others are the scientists who study the problems of well-being and poverty of the Ukrainian households within the frame of economic situation in families and in the country.

Migration activity and migration attitudes / intentions of Ukrainians are the subject of scientific research of E. Libanova, I. Pribitkova, O. Malinovskaya, O. Poznyak, D. Melnychuk and others.

Instead, much less research is being done on regional empirical material, and therefore, the presented scientific development is relevant both scientifically and practically.

Purpose and methodology

The purpose of this article is to present the results of a questionnaire survey of residents of three regional centers of Southern Ukraine (Odessa, Mykolaiv and Kherson) showing the assessment of the respondents' level of their economic well-being, economic status / prospects of Ukraine on the one hand, and emigration respondents (considerations of probable departure from Ukraine to a permanent place of residence), from the other hand.

The methodology and research tactics were developed by the staff of the Department of Sociology of the Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University within the framework of the research theme “Effective functioning and development of the regional socio-cultural environment in the context of decentralization as a guarantee of the national security of Ukraine”. The research stage of the study was conducted by the Mykolaiv Center of Sociological Research with the support of the South Ukrainian Branch of the Sociological Association of Ukraine in September-October 2018.

The survey geography was represented by three regional centers of the South of Ukraine, the general population (1312707 people) was the permanent population of 18 years and older, 694667 people living in Odessa, 35850 people living in Mykolaiv, and 259790 people living in Kherson. The sample of the study is multi-staged (the first stage is the selection of the areas of residence of respondents; the second stage is the probable selection of streets, houses where the informants were interviewed; the third is the quota selection of units of observation on such socio-demographic characteristics as the gender and age of the respondents). The sample is representative by age, gender and place of residence of the respondents.

The sample size was N=801 people, including:

1) 53.1% in Odesa (by place of residence 23.9% of respondents were polled in the Kyiv district ofthe city, in 24.6% of respondents were interviewed in Malinovskiy district, 24.7% of respondents were in Primorskiy district, and 26.8% were interviewed in Suvorovskiy district; by sex 46.0% of men and 54.0% of women were interviewed; by age: 19.4% persons were from 18 to 29 years old, at the age of 30-39 years there were 20.5%, at the age of 40-49 years there were 17.1%, 16.0% from the interviewed were aged 5049 years, and 27.0% were over 60 years old);

2) 27.2% in Mykolaiv (26.5% of them were interviewed at the place of residence in the Zavodskiy district of the city, 27.9% in the Ingulskiy district, 17.6% in the Korabelniy district, and 28.0% in the Central district; by gender: 45.5% of men and 54.5% of women were interviewed; by age: 18.4% of respondents were 18-29 years old, 23.3% of interviewed were at the age of 30-39 years, 18.4% were at the age of 40- 49 years, 18.1% of respondents were aged 50-49 years, and 21.8% of respondents were over 60 years old);

3) 19.7% in Kherson (29.0% of informants were interviewed in the Dnieper district of the city, 35.1% in Korabelniy, 35.9% in Suvorovskiy; by sex: there were 40.0% of men and 60.0% of women; by age: 12.7% of respondents were aged 18-29 years, 19.7% were 30-39 years old, 24.8% of respondents were 40-49 years old, 18.5% were at the age of 50-49 years, and 24.2% were over 60 years old).

The initial sample of population is divided into qualitatively homogeneous groups by the place of residence of the respondents, their sex and age according to available statistics Державна служба статистики України. Інститут демографії та соціальних досліджень ім. М.В. Птухи НАН України. URL: http://database.ukrcensus.gov.ua/PXWEB2007/index.htm; Державна служба статистики України. Статистичні збірники «Розподіл постійного населення України за статтю та віком» та «Населення України». URL: http://www.ukrstat.gov.ua; Data on the Number of Voters / Central Election Commission. State Register of Voters - 10/31/2018. URL: https://www.drv.gov.ua/portal. The design effect of the sample is 3.5%.

A face-to-face interview method was used to collect the primary sociological information. The toolkit of the survey provided for the measurement of subjective assessments of informants of such social indicators as: economic status of households, country on the whole; intentions, causes and directions of possible immigration.

Description of the obtained results

The results of the survey indicated the following: inhabitants of regional centers of the Southern region critically evaluated the economic situation and financial capabilities of their households, showed restrained optimism (on the principle of “no worse off”) about their own life prospects for the coming year, and extremely negatively evaluated the overall socio-economic situation in Ukraine the development of this situation in the country (“things are moving in the wrong direction”). ukraine self esteem emigration

Thus, almost a third of respondents in total rated their family economic situation as “bad” and “very bad”, and more than half of the respondents rated it as “satisfactory”; while positive assessment was just over 15%. In the age ratio, the most critical was the assessment of the older age respondents (50-59 years and more than 60): here the total negative ratings of “bad” and “very bad” fluctuated around the mark of 40%, with the category “very bad” estimating 8% of respondents over the age of 60; good assessment showed a downward trend in age - from 24.8% of respondents aged 18-29 to 4.3% in the 60+ age group; finally, none of the most senior age group (60+) respondents rated their family economic status as “very good”.

The general distribution of answers illustrating the respondents' assessment of the economic status of their families by age distribution is presented in Table 1.

Table 1. Respondents' assessment of economic status of their families, age distribution

The most critically assessed was the economic status of Kherson families, where the smallest number of respondents (8.3%) rated their economic status as “good”, compared with the other two cities, while the largest number chose “bad” (32.5%) and “satisfactory” (58.6%).

The general distribution of answers illustrating the respondents' assessment of their families' economic status, by region on the whole and individually by its three cities is presented in Table 2.

Table 2. Respondents' assessment of their families' economic status, region and city distribution

Similar pattern is also found when analyzing the answers of the respondents, which illustrate the financial potential of their families in terms of spending money on purchasing goods and saving money.

Here, the largest number of respondents (42.1%) chose the answer “We have enough money for food, but it is difficult to buy clothes”, but 13.6% were even more categorical “We have enough money for food”. Only a third (33.6%) of the respondents chose the average variant “We have enough money for food, clothes, and we can save some money” but another 9.2% said they could afford to buy some valuable items, and only 1.5% said they could afford to spend some expenses (the answer to the question is “We can afford whatever we want”).

The age distribution of respondents' answers to this question reveals the following situation. More than half (55.7%) of the respondents in the age group of 18-29 years, chose the answer “We have enough money for food, clothes and we can save some money”. All other age categories preferred the position “We have enough money but it is difficult to buy clothes”, but with the following dynamics: 38% of respondents in the age group 30-39 years, 45.2% in the age group 40-49, almost half of the respondents (51.8% and 49.2%, respectively) in the age groups of 50-59 years and 60+. Moreover, the last-mentioned had significant number of choosing the statement “We have enough money for food” (16.1 and 30%), and no respondent in age group 60+ chose the option “We can afford everything what we want” which is a clear testimony to the poverty of the older generations in the region.

The overall distribution of answers illustrating respondents' assessment of their families' financial capabilities in age distribution is presented in Table 3.

Table 3. Respondents' assessment of financial capabilities, age distribution

Speaking about cities, the most critical assessment was observed in Kherson residents like in the previous question. The overwhelming majority (80.9%) of the respondents indicated that the statements showing the limited ability of family expenses.

Table 4 shows the general distribution of answers illustrating the respondents' assessments of their families' financial capabilities for spending money, abilities for buying and saving, in the region on the whole and in three cities where we conducted the survey.

Table 4. Residents' assessment of financial capabilities of their families, region and city distribution

The results of the survey here allow us to evaluate the state of affairs in the terminology of the scientific discourse of poverty: “subjective poverty”, “relative poverty” and “deprivation” (restriction or complete deprivation).

Since the end of the XIX century there exists the world standard for assessing the standard of living of the population where those families (households) who spend 60% (and more) of their cumulative monthly income on “basic needs” which include food, housing and utilities, travel, clothing, are considered to be poor Traditional for the XX century the concept of “relative poverty” is based on the basic statement that poverty is “the inability to sustain a society-specific lifestyle over a given period of time due to lack of resources”. Thus, a person considers oneself (or others) poor if he/ she is unable to meet the average standards of living characteristic of a given society with its appropriate level of development. Finally, within the most modern “deprivation” concept, “poverty is estimated not on the resources available to one or another family, but on living conditions based on the list of goods deprived of the poor”. According to T. Chernenko, an expert at the National Institute for Strategic Studies, the factors that separate the truly poor from the more affluent should now be considered access to healthy lifestyles, quality nutrition, high-quality (not state-guaranteed free) health care, quality education, normal living conditions, as well as access to work that is appropriate for a person's educational qualifications Зануда А. (2013). Бідність в Україні - від 2% до 65%. URL: https://www.bbc.com/ukrainian/ business/2013/08/130819_poverty_ukrame_az.

In this context, the results of the presented survey (as well as the above-mentioned national polls), where more than half of the respondents (55.7%) confessed that their cumulative family income allowed to make only these most necessary expenses, and to make some savings only 33.6% were very indicative.

In terms of predicting respondents' prospects for their family's life for the coming year, the survey results indicated the combined advantage of the two conditionally optimistic scenarios, “Somewhat Better” (28.3%) and “Remain the Same as Now” (44.9%), which in the result was just over 2/3 of the respondents' answers. Although it can be seen that “outspoken optimists” (those who chose “Much better” and “Somewhat better”) are only 22.2%, compared with 38.2% “outspoken pessimists” (those who chose “Much worse” and “Somewhat worse”).

In the age distribution, we observed that in all age categories the average variant of the forecast “the same as now” prevailed, ranging from 38.5 to 45.6%; a more optimistic vision occurred in young people (“Much Better” and “Somewhat Better” variants had approximately 20% each) and middle-aged respondents, where optimistic moods were most prevalent (almost 30%). On the other hand, more pessimistic attitudes were characteristic of the respondents of the two older age groups, where the variants of “Somewhat worse” and “Much worse” gained a total of 40.1 and 46%, respectively.

An overall distribution of answers illustrating respondents' predictions of their family's life prospects for the coming year by age distribution is presented in Table 5.

Table 5. Predicting respondents' perspectives of family life for the coming year, age distribution

In assessments of life prospects for individual cities, we observed differences where residents of Kherson showed much more pessimistic moods than in the whole region, and residents of more well-to-do Odessa were mostly optimistic.

The overall distribution of responses illustrating respondents' assessment of their family's life prospects for the coming year, by region on the whole and by its three individual cities is presented in Table 6.

Table 6. Predicting respondents' perspectives of family life for the coming year, region and city distribution

The respondents' assessment of the general economic situation of Ukraine, as well as the prospects for its change in the next year, as well as the general nature (direction) of the state of affairs development in the country are much more pessimistic.

Thus, the results of the survey showed that in terms of respondents' assessment of the current economic situation in Ukraine, the negative variants “Bad” and “Very bad” (82.1% by region) were significantly cumulative, while only 3.5% shared positive assessments; respondents with positive and neutral assessments did not gain even 20%.

Age distribution indicated that there were no significant differences in the estimates of economic status in different age groups of respondents; even young respondents of the first two age groups gave negative perspectives which got about 2/3 of all answers.

The overall age distribution of respondents' assessment of current economic status of Ukraine is presented in Table 7.

Table 7. Respondents' assessment of economic status of Ukraine, age distribution

Speaking about individual cities, the most negative assessment was given by Kherson (89.2%) and Mykolaiv (86.4%), despite the fact that the option of assessing the economic status as “Good” did not exceed 2.5%, and the option “Very Good” was not chosen at all by any respondents from Kherson or from Mykolaiv.

The overall distribution of respondents' assessment of Ukraine's economic status by individual cities and by region on the whole is presented in Table 8.

Table 8. The respondents' assessment of economic status of Ukraine, region and city distribution

In terms of predicting respondents' nearest prospects for life in Ukraine and, consequently, its economic status, cautious optimism was fixed here, as was the case with the prospects of life of one's family for the coming year. That is, the largest percentage of respondents' answers came from the option “Remain the same as it is now” (39.6% by region). However, the negative forecasts actually exceeded the positive ones - it was 38.2 versus 22.2%.

The results of age distribution of radical differences in the assessment of different age categories respondents were not recorded. However, in the 60+ age category, the proportion of pessimists (“It will be slightly worse” and “It will be much worse”) is higher, 5-15% different from others.

The corresponding overall age distribution of respondents' assessment of life in Ukraine for the coming year in terms of improvement / deterioration is presented in Table 9.

Table 9. Respondents' assessment of prospects of life in Ukraine for the coming year, age distribution

The residents of Kherson are more pessimistic than in the previous question. Thus, more than 43% of Kherson residents voted for “Somewhat worse” and “Much worse” variants against 35.7% of Odessa residents and 39.4% of Mykolaiv residents. The variants of “Somewhat better” and “Much better” in Odessa and Mykolaiv collectively gained 26.4 and 30%, respectively against 21.6% in Kherson.

A relatively large proportion of respondents from Odessa and Mykolaiv expressed their hope that life in Ukraine would not change the following year (the answer “remain the same as it is now”), which can be interpreted as cautious optimism on the principle of “no worse” (at least, so far): this variant collected more than the cumulative positive and negative forecasts from the residents of these cities, but in Kherson this conditionally optimistic forecast received less than the cumulative negative 35.7 against 43.3%.

The overall distribution of respondents' assessments of prospects for Ukrainian economic situation, by city and by region on the whole, is presented in Table 10.

Table 10. Respondents' assessment of life prospects in Ukraine for the coming year, region and city distribution

Finally, the most striking criticism of the situation in Ukraine in recent years was the results of the answers to the question, concerning the correct / wrong direction of the “course of affairs in Ukraine”.

Here, the 2/3 of the respondents (73%) in the whole region chose the “the wrong direction” option, with only 9.5% choosing the opposite alternative as their own assessment of the situation (with Kherson and Mykolaiv even less than 7% each). Almost a fifth (17.5%) of the respondents was unable to give answer, which could not be qualified as positive.

However, it should be emphasized that the survey presented here, was conducted in autumn of 2018, that is, a few months before this year's presidential and parliamentary elections, the results of which raised a considerable wave of hopes of the residents of Ukraine to change the situation in the country for the better with the arrival a new “government team”.

Table 11. Respondents' assessment of the direction of the course of affairs in Ukraine, region and city distribution

The corresponding overall distribution of responses presenting respondents' assessment of the direction of the course of affairs in Ukraine in autumn 2018 is presented in Table 11.

The age distribution of the answers to this question showed, first of all, that not only the elderly, but also the youth of the region critically assessed the course of events in Ukraine: for example, in the age group of 18-29 years, 72.5% of respondents spoke in favor option “Things are going in the wrong direction now”. More “optimistic”, but still with a huge advantage of negative evaluation, were only representatives of the age group of 30-39 years, where this option scored “only” 66.7% against 15.2% of those who looked at development of the course in Ukraine as commendable).

The overall distribution of respondents' answers to this question by age distribution, is presented in Table 12.

Table 12. Respondents' assessment of the direction of the course of affairs in Ukraine, age distribution

It is not surprising that in such conditions of life and assessment of the situation in the country, its prospects for the nearest future, foreign migration consideration prevails, especially among young people.

That is why, within the framework of the presented survey of the residents of the regional cities of Southern Ukraine, it was also envisaged to establish the emigration intentions of the respondents, as well as more specific orientations regarding the desired direction of their probable departure abroad.

The results of the survey showed that more than half (54.4%) of the respondents in the region did not mind emigrating from Ukraine (although the limitation condition in the proposed question should be taken into account here “if it was possible”). Another 8.2% fluctuated in response to this question, and this could also be interpreted as an indicator of these respondents' thinking over this perspective.

The age distribution of respondents' emigrant attitudes convincingly indicated that young people and middle-aged people (the first three age groups) thought the most about leaving, where affirmative answers to the questionnaire exceeded 60% and aspirations to stay at home did not reach 30%. Only people over the age of 50 (the last two age categories) had the opposite proportion of responses.

It is clear that people between the ages of 18 and 50 are the cornerstone of any country's demo-economic potential. That is why such an obvious prevalence of emigration among them, especially on the background of not very optimistic forecasts of both their own future and the future of the country, is a serious challenge for the economic and demographic prospects of the Ukrainian state.

The complete age distribution of respondents' answers to the question “If you had the opportunity today to emigrate for living abroad, would you do it?” is presented in Table 13.

Table 13. Emigration moods / intentions of respondents, age distribution

In terms of individual cities of Southern Ukraine, it turned out that the most attuned to departure is Mykolaiv (60.1%) followed by Kherson (54.8%) and Odessa (51.5%). A somewhat more optimistic situation with the emigrant intentions of Odessa residents may be explained by the higher standard of living in this city compared to Mykolaiv and Kherson.

However, in all cities, respondents' emigrant moods / intentions still exceed the 50% limit.

The overall distribution of the answers to the question “If you had the opportunity today to emigrate for living abroad, would you do it?” by region on the whole and by individual cities, is presented in Table 14.

Table 14. Emigration moods / intentions of the respondents, region and city distribution

In terms of the direction of possible emigration (that is, migration orientations), the western vector (North America - 28.8%, Western Europe - 20.9%, Central and Eastern European countries - 20.5%; in total - 70.2%) compared to the Eurasian (Russia and other Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries collectively got 20.3%, with the Russian Federation actually less than “other CIS countries”).

Obviously, a key factor in such external migration orientations is the resilience of today's Ukrainians to associate “collective West” countries with high standards of living, modern civilization benefits, human rights and social opportunities for themselves and their descendants.

Age distribution shows (and is quite predictable in modern times) that not only the “Western vector” of potential emigration, but its “American- Canadian” variant, is the most popular.

Thus, younger respondents clearly favored the United States and Canada (37%), as well as European countries (where Western European countries gained 20.2% and Central and Eastern European countries (CEE) gained 21.8%, which in total was just over 40%).

The representatives of the oldest age group (people aged 60+), who are traditionally more or less positive about Russia or the CIS, similarly preferred the “western vector”: it gained favor with more than 40% of respondents in this age category against only a third (on the whole) of those who were likely to travel to Russia and other CIS countries. Although, the Russian variant in this age category, of course, gained more than others, the number of votes was 22.8% (for comparison: Russia was chosen as a country of possible emigration choice by 10.3% of respondents aged 50-59 years and only by 3.4% of young people aged 18-29). A similar pattern of emigration orientations was observed in other age groups of respondents.

The overall age distribution of the answers presenting the respondents' emigration orientations is presented in Table 15.

Table 15. Emigration orientation of the respondents, age distribution (respondents could choose more than one answer)

In the context of the respondents' answers from individual cities of the Southern region, we noted that the option “USA, Canada” as a possible departure option gained a relative majority in all cities of the region without exception, and that more than others were attuned to this option in Odessa (31.6% against 28.8% in Mykolaiv and in Kherson); Western Europe took the second place in Odessa and Mykolaiv choices while Kherson put Central and Eastern Europe to the second place.

On the other hand, there were more supporters of the variants “Russia (Russian Federation)” and “Other CIS countries” in Kherson (in total - 26.6%). “Russia” as a more likely country of emigration was chosen by Odessa (10.8% against 8.5% by Kherson and 6.1% by Mykolaiv). A variant “other CIS countries” was more often voted for by Kherson (18.1% against 10% of Odessa and 9.8% of Mykolaiv).

The overall distribution of the respondents' answers to the question “If you had an opportunity to emigrate for living abroad, where would you go” presenting their more or less crystallized emigration orientations, by region and by individual cities is presented in Table 16.

Table 16. Emigration orientation of the respondents, region and city distribution (respondents could choose more than one answer)

The analysis of the obtained picture of the emigration orientations of the inhabitants of the South of Ukraine should also take into account the fact that the majority of respondents (61.9%) noted that they had relatives, friends, acquaintances who had already emigrated from Ukraine to the following countries: Russia (19.8%), other CIS countries (10.5%), Eastern and Central Europe (21.9%), Western Europe (18.8%), USA or Canada (24%) and other countries (3.3%). 1.7% of the respondents could not decide on this issue. It is clear that having a successful overseas settlement of their relatives and friends in countries associated with high standards of living, can play the role of an additional argument in favor of the emigrant option that is being considered in the respondent's family.

The complete distribution of respondents' answers to the question “Where did your acquaintances, friends or relatives emigrate to?” by region and by individual cities is presented in Table 17.

Table 17. Respondents, relatives, friends, acquaintances, who emigrated from Ukraine, region and city distributio...