As the European Union ages, it’s increasingly dependent on migration to sustain its economies. Unfortunately, the bloc’s inability to manage this influx is warping its politics. Unless it can build a better system — one that combines credible border controls with economic opportunity — it risks further decline and fracture.

Each year, the EU loses about a million people of working age. In 22 of its 27 member states, the working population will shrink by 2050. From 2019 to 2023, nearly two-thirds of new jobs were filled by non-EU citizens. This surge has created significant pressures, both practical and political.

Frontline southern countries and wealthy northern ones have taken in huge flows of migrants since the 1990s. A refugee crisis that started in 2015 — with more than a million mig

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