If I wanted to immigrate to, say, Estonia next year, how difficult would it be?
Additionally, other posters have been right about ethnic Russians leaving the Baltics, which is something governments have actually been trying to encourage anyhow. The Soviets had hugely increased the number of ethnic Russians in the Baltics, nearly to the point of overtaking the native populations.
Wikipedia has a partial graph for Latvia: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b1/Ethnic_gr...
> The Soviets had hugely increased the number of ethnic
> Russians in the Baltics
I'm half Australian and half Estonian - and have citizenship of both countries. I've worked as a developer in both countries, and currently reside (and work) in Estonia. I see this attitude all the time in Estonia; despite the obvious need for immigration, many people would rather see the population keep on decreasing. Currently it's simply too difficult for professionals to get an Estonian visa, and wages are not attractive enough, in general, to attract those with an EU passport. This is part of the problem that will, in time, kill Estonia and likely the other Baltic countries.
From the little time I've spent in Finland though, I've seen a lot of this type of attitude. People are generally happy to see visitors as long as the visitors don't try to speak their language or talk about moving to the country. Tallinn seems like a nice place, though.
I do not now about that. My impression is that American immigration is just more promoted (and exploited) than in other countries, not necessarily easier or more open. It is like an industry on itself. Other countries are not that eager to sell themselves to immigrants, which I guess it's because the general feeling about what already belongs to locals and is not to be sold.
I used the 'dying' comparison as it's an emotional issue for me, as a 'new Estonian'. I hope very much that my pessimistic extrapolation will prove to be incorrect.