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ByElliotSpagat The Associated Press SAN DIEGO More Mexi- cans are leaving than mov- ing into the United States, reversing the flow of a half- century of mass migration, according to a study pub- lished Thursday. The Pew Research Cen- ter found that slightly more than 1 million Mex- icans and their families, including American-born children, left the U.S. for Mexico from 2009 to 2014. During the same five years, 870,000 Mexicans came to the U.S., resulting in a net flow to Mexico of 140,000. The desire to reunite families is the main reason more Mexicans are mov- ing south than north, Pew found. The sluggish U.S. economic recovery and tougher border enforce- ment are other key factors. The era of mass migra- tion from Mexico is "at an end," declared Mark Hugo Lopez, Pew's director of Hispanic research. The finding follows a Pew study in 2012 that found net migration between the two countries was near zero, so this represents a turn- ing point in one of the larg- est mass migrations in U.S. history. More than 16 mil- lion Mexicans moved to the United States from 1965 to 2015, more than from any other country. "This is something that we've seen coming," Lopez said. "It's been almost 10 years that migration from Mexico has really slowed down." The findings counter the narrative of an out-of-con- trol border that has fig- ured prominently in U.S. presidential campaigns, with Republican Donald Trump calling for Mexico pay for a fence to run the entire length of the 1,954- mile frontier. Pew said there were 11.7 million Mexicans living in the U.S. last year, down from a peak of 12.8 million in 2007. That in- cludes 5.6 million living in the U.S. illegally, down from 6.9 million in 2007. In another first, the Bor- der Patrol arrested more non-Mexicans than Mexi- cans in the 2014 fiscal year, as more Central Americans came to the U.S., mostly through South Texas, and many of them turned them- selves in to authorities. The authors analyzed U.S. and Mexican census data and a 2014 survey by Mexico's National Institute of Statistics and Geogra- phy. The Mexican question- naire asked about residen- tial history, and found that 61 percent of those who re- ported living in the U.S. in 2009 but were back in Mex- ico last year had returned to join or start a family. An additional 14 percent had been deported, and 6 per- cent said they returned for jobs in Mexico. Dowell Myers, a public policy professor at the Uni- versity of Southern Califor- nia, said it's lack of jobs in the U.S. — not family ties — that is mostly motivat- ing Mexicans to leave. Con- struction is a huge draw for young immigrants, but has yet to approach the levels of last decade's housing boom, he said. "It's not like all of a sud- den they decided they missed their mothers," My- ers said. "The fact is, our re- covery from the Great Re- cession has been miserable. It's been miserable for ev- eryone." Also, Mexico's population is aging, meaning there's less competition for young people looking for work. That's a big change from the 1990s, when many peo- ple entering the workforce felt they had no choice but to migrate north of the bor- der, Myers said. While the U.S. economic recovery is sluggish, Mex- ico has been free in recent years from the economic tailspins that drove ear- lier generations north in the 1980s and 1990s. While many parts of Mexico suf- fer grinding poverty and violence, others have be- come thriving manufac- turing centers under the North American Free Trade Agreement. Automakers including Volkswagen AG, Ford Mo- tor Co. and General Mo- tors Corp. have built plants across central and north- ern Mexico that employ thousands, spawning auto- parts plants and other rip- ple effects. Highways and rail lines that connect to the world's largest economy north of the border have at- tracted more investors. "The main reason for my return is family," José Arel- lano Correa, a 41-year-old Mexico City taxi driver who came back from the U.S. in 2005. "I could help them while I was there, but fam- ily comes before money." Farmworkers recruited from Mexico to harvest U.S. crops had followed the sea- sons back and forth across the border until 1965, when the U.S. imposed numeri- cal limits on Latin Ameri- can immigrants for the first time, launching new waves of illegal immigration that flowed north for decades thereafter. A federal law passed in 1986, four years after Mex- ico's economy convulsed, led to a more fortified bor- der and legal status for millions of migrants. Poli- cies toughened even more after 9/11, with the Border Patrol doubling in size and the U.S. erecting hundreds of miles of fences, and Ari- zona led a backlash in state capitols as Mexicans moved beyond traditional destina- tions like Los Angeles and Chicago, settling in towns throughout the South and Midwest. ManyMexicansintheU.S. have become frustrated and fearful as efforts to overhaul immigration laws stalled in Congress and President Barack Obama deported roughly 2 million people during the first five years of his administration. Obama's 2014 order shielding many others from deportation re- mains blocked in court. Mexicans who remain in the U.S. also seem more detached from their home- land than before. Pew said their median age was 39 years in 2013, compared to 29 in 1990. More than three in four had been in the U.S. for more than a decade, compared to only half in 1990. And only 35 percent of adults in Mex- ico say they have friends or relatives they regularly communicate with or visit in the U.S., down 7 percent- age points from 2007, Pew found. IMMIGRATION Study: More Mexicans leaving the US than coming PHOTOSBYGREGORYBULL—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS Men look for a place to sleep in a crowded shelter for migrants deported from the United States, in the border city of Nogales, Mexico. People make their way towards the border to cross in Mexicali, Mexico. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2015 REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM | NEWS | 7 A