Personal remittances: receipts and payments, annual, 1980-2015

Description

The data presents time series on receipts and payments of personal remittances in millions of dollars. The data is also shown as percentage of exports (receipts) and imports (payments) of goods and services, and as percentage of GDP.
Personal remittances is defined as the sum of two items: (1) compensation of employees, defined as the income of non-resident workers employed in an economy and of residents employed by nonresident employers; (2) personal (current) transfers, defined as current transfers in kind or in cash, between resident and nonresident households. These are the two items in the balance of payments framework that substantially relate to remittances. Both are standard components in the current account. A broader definition of personal remittances would also include capital transfers between resident and nonresident households. However, capital transfers is a supplementary component in the capital account. As a result data coverage on capital transfers is much sparse than the other two items.
The data on compensation of employees, personal transfers and capital transfers between households have been collected by the IMF from national agencies or, in cases of non-availability, estimated by the IMF.