Border: France-Luxembourg

A highly permeable border

The France-Luxembourg border extends over a short distance at the heart of a region which historically has seen many periods of upheaval (until 1945). It links Lorraine (principally the department of Moselle) to the Grand Duchy. A highly permeable “melting pot-border”, it passes through densely populated and highly urbanised areas, especially along its western section where there are two cross-border conurbations that grew up around the steel industry: the Longwy European Development Pole and Alzette-Belval.

The France-Luxembourg border is characterised by very large flows of cross-border workers. On account of its high-level tertiary sector (banks, insurance companies, European and international institutions), its advantageous tax regime and high wages, the Grand Duchy represents a very attractive job market for people living in the border area. Cross-border workers thus account for nearly 45% of Luxembourg’s economically active population. The upward trend in the number of cross-border workers is continuing every year. While jobs have declined in the industrial sector, they have increased in “highly-qualified” activities such as service activities, information, communication and new technologies.

Regarding flows of French workers, 94,694 of them travelled to their place of work in Luxembourg on a daily basis in 2018. The majority of these workers come from the border areas (Longwy, Thionville and Saint-Avold-Forbach-Sarreguemines), but Luxembourg is drawing people from ever further into the Lorraine Region, including from as far as Metz and Nancy. Many other flows also take place across the border, notably in the areas of trade, healthcare, education, culture and tourism.

This cross-border phenomenon has had positive effects on parts of Northern Lorraine that were hard hit by de-industrialisation. The region’s demographic recovery, after forty years of decline, and the stimulus provided by the residential economy are among these. However, it has also had some harmful effects: as well as the saturation of road and rail links, it has increased the social divide between employment areas where there are high levels of poverty (30% of the workers working in the Longwy area are on a low income) and areas where property prices are soaring as a result of the large numbers of people settling near the border, attracted by the “Eldorado” of Luxembourg.