When we think about immigrants, why don't we think about Einstein and Ronaldo?

When most people hear the word <x0mgrition” or <x2 immigrants”, they probably think of people in packed little boats heading towards Greece or Italy. I suspect that the word “migrant” brings up images of Cristiano Ronaldo, Kate Winslet, or Albert Einstein. That's what people don't think about immigrants. But that's exactly what it takes.

The world's most successful footballer, the second most successful film actor of all time, and one of the smartest people in history is technically immigrants. I'm not choosing people but bullshit. My research shows that 55% of international football players, nearly half of the best actors and best-nominated actresses for Oscar since 2000, and nearly one-third of the Nobel Prize nominated since 1901 were immigrants.

The UN migration agency defines the immigrant as “any person who has moved or moved to international borders or within a state but away from his/her country, regardless of legal status; regardless of reasons for movement; or length of stay at a certain” destination. The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs accounts as the <x2 of the international immigrants” for people living in an external state from where they were born or whose passport they hold. The UN recommends that each who stays in another country more than three months should be considered an international immigrant.

Ronaldo, Winslet and Einstein according to these definitions are. Ronaldo is a Portuguese citizen who worked in England and Spain for the greatest time of his career; Winslet, British, worked and lived in the United States also for the greatest time of her career; The German Nobel winner Albert Einstein has worked at the University of Princeton for more than 20 years and has taken over US citizenship in 1940.

The UN estimates that there are approximately 258 million international immigrants in the world, accounting for 3.4% of the world's population. But there are more involved in football, acting and academy than generally in the world. People don't usually connect migration with rich and famous, but the data shows something else.

My analysis based on Fifa 2007 statistics shows that 55% of football players who are available to play for a national team in 201 play for a club abroad. More than 90% of Colombia, Belgium, Ireland, Sweden and Switzerland players play abroad; 87% of the Argentina national and 83% of Brazil's nationals take the money abroad whose citizenship they keep. The average is lower for most European teams: 48% of Spaniards, 38% of French and German, and 13% of Italians are de facto migrants. Of the 100 best footballers in 2017, 72 are immigrants. These statistics do not even include football players who were born in a different country than those who grew up and who later attained citizenship.

Looking at the data of all the nominated awards for the best actors since 2000, I found that on average, 41% of those beautiful and talented people were immigrants. Either they were born abroad and had gone to Hollywood or worked in the United States for a long period of time. Both make these immigrants. There are more female immigrants in the United States than men: 45% of nominal women were born outside the US or carrying non-American passports compared to 33% of men. Most may be from Britain, Australia, or Canada, but this is because most foreign actors have mother tongue.

Based on analysis of all Nobel laureates from 1901, 29% of all Nobel nominated in various disciplines were immigrants. “Emigrant” in this case implies that they were nominated for their work at an institute that was outside their native country [Despite changing borders]. The percentage varies from time to time between 0%, for example, in 1922, 1965, and 1976, and 75% in 1957 and 1971. There doesn't seem to be any clear rise or drop of percentage.

And despite this extraordinary success of immigrants, hostility towards them remains. Ipsos Mori indicated that in most Western countries, people overestimate the number of immigrants living in their country. This data shows that we can even have a distorted idea about who the immigrants really are or what they bring with them. The perception matters. They can infect the general government against immigration policies and dictate elections.

Maybe most of what's wrong with how we think of immigration is reflected in the question of why we don't think of successful, rich, smart and beautiful people as immigrants. 258 million international immigrants whom the UN values as immigrants are from various fields: football, acting, Nobel laureates, but they are also nurses, farmers, mechanisms, cooks, entrepreneurs and all deserve recognition. /Guardian/Periscopi