A few years ago, Spain's booming economy was a magnet for immigrants. More than four million entered the country, increasing the population by about 10 percent. Now, unemployment has soared to nearly 14 percent — the highest in the European Union.
MADELEINE BRAND, host: This is Day to Day. I'm Madeleine Brand.</s>ALEX COHEN, host: I'm Alex Cohen. In a few minutes, you love your chiropractor but you can't afford him anymore. Advice for break-ups in the recession.</s>MADELEINE BRAND, host: A recession that's gone global. In Spain, more than 3 million Spaniards are out of work. Just a few years ago, the country was so prosperous it attracted millions of immigrants. Now, they're finding that their new country is not so welcoming. Jerome Socolovsky reports from Madrid.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: The bus to Bucharest has just pulled in to the Madrid south bus terminal. A crowd of Romanians shuffles towards the door, dragging heavy bags and bundles, even the odd TV. Nicoleta Badjan(ph) is among the passengers. Not long ago, she lost her job as an elderly woman's live-in nurse, and her husband lost his job as a construction worker.</s>Ms. NICOLETA BADJAN: (Romanian spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: I'm going back almost empty-handed, she says. The idea was to earn money and save up here in Spain.</s>Ms. NICOLETA BADJAN: (Romanian spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: But we can't manage anymore. When things don't work out, it's better for everyone to go back to their own place and their own home, she adds. Just a few years ago, it was an entirely different story. Spain had one of Europe's fastes- growing economies, and immigrants had jobs for the taking as construction workers, domestic servants and farm laborers. Since the beginning of this decade, Spain's population has swelled by more than 10 percent as 5 million immigrants arrived in the country. Most came from Romania, Morocco, Latin America and West Africa.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Mamadu Baji(ph) is Senegalese. It was a harrowing voyage that took him in a large, crowded canoe from a beach in West Africa to Spain's Canary Islands.</s>Mr. MAMADU BAJI: (Senegalese spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: It took nine days, he says. It was really tough because the last two days, there was nothing to eat. I don't even know how to swim. We could've all died. Baji didn't have working papers, but he got a job in the south of Spain picking olives. Now, he's out of work. This harvest season, towns in the olive-producing region of Andalusia are overflowing with immigrants sleeping in public parks and church shelters because jobless locals are being hired instead, and there are plenty of them.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Unemployment in Spain has reached 13.9 percent. That's the highest rate in the European Union, and it's forecast to reach almost 20 percent before the recession is over.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: Juan Carlos Rodriguez walks out of an unemployment office in the Madrid suburb of Colmenar Viejo. Two weeks ago, the Internet company, where the 35-year-old IT specialist worked, went bust. He says that at some point, he, too, may have to take the kind of job that immigrants have been doing.</s>Mr. JUAN CARLOS RODRIGUEZ: (Spanish spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: I'll try to hold on a bit and look for a job that fits my experience. But if there's no alternative, that's what I'll have to do, he says. At bus stops and subway stations, the Labor Ministry has put up billboards advertising financial incentives for immigrants to leave the country. But it's basically the unemployment benefit they're already entitled to, except that it would be paid in advance if they hand over their residence papers.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: During the first month of the program, so far, only 767 people sent in applications. Romanians and people from other European Union countries don't qualify for the paid-return program. But because of the EU's open borders, they know that if things get better, they can just hop on a bus and come back. Authorities are worried about the millions of other foreigners left languishing in Spain as the economy weakens.</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: In the southern region of Almeria, which exports fruits and vegetables all over Europe, race riots have already broken out between Africans, gypsies and Moroccans. Back at the Madrid bus terminal, Mamadu Baji says his life in Spain hasn't worked out as he'd hoped.</s>Mr. MAMADU BAJI: (Senegalese spoken)</s>JEROME SOCOLOVSKY: It's been a big disappointment, he says, a big disappointment. But for the moment, I'm not going back to Senegal. He nearly died trying to reach Europe, so he says he'd rather stay in Spain and suffer through the recession. For NPR News, I'm Jerome Socolovky in Madrid.