Indicator: People Balance Index

Within the balance dimension the primary indicator is the balance index, defined as the ratio between the difference in inflow-outflow and the maximum value of inflow or outflow. The index takes values from -1 to 1, where -1 means outflow only, 0 means perfectly balanced flow, and 1 means inflow only.
In the people basket air passengers is the flow type characterized by small differences in balance. For almost all regions containing airports, the number of departing passengers is almost equal to the num-ber of arriving passengers.
In the case of migration, the core-periphery system is clearly visible in Europe. In Central and Eastern Europe — especially in Poland, the Baltic States, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, and to a lesser extent in Greece, southern Italy, Portugal, and Spain — a significant migration outflow dominates. On the other hand, the receivers are regions in Norway, western Germany (the territory of the former GDR is still a strong sender), northern Italy, Austria, Switzerland, and the Benelux countries. In France, the spatial range of influence of Paris is clearly visible as a center attracting migrations from the area of northeastern France. Also in Central and Eastern Europe, metropolises are noticeable as centers of attraction, i.e. Warsaw, Prague, Budapest, Bucharest, and Berlin.
A clear city-core receiver and NUTS2 senders surrounding the city are visible in labour mobility. Be-cause of the relatively short distances in labour mobility, the core-periphery system in most countries is domestic, although there are exceptions. For example, Luxembourg is a strong labour mobility attractor for neighboring countries, as is Iceland. On the other hand, countries such as Estonia and Latvia are becoming strong senders, mainly to the Scandinavian countries, according to the available data.
Tourism is, in a way, a mirror of labour mobility and migration. Cities and agglomerations are the largest tourist senders, and peripheral areas attractive to tourists are receivers. This spatial pattern is visible in all countries. Even in such attractive tourist cities as Rome, Paris, and Vienna, the number of departing tourists, in the light of the project results, outweighs the number of visiting tourists. Only certain countries — above all Germany and Great Britain — are characterised by a more polycentric pattern of senders in tourism. In many other countries only one or two cities have a positive balance of tourism flows.
The results of the synthetic matrix for the people basket are difficult to interpret. The total balance of flows in agglomerations is usually close to zero, because large cities are senders in tourism and receiv-ers in labour mobility and migrations. On the other hand, in peripheral areas attractive to tourists be-cause of migratory trips, the balance is also somewhat balanced. The high positive balance is neverthe-less noticeable on the Italian-Austrian border and on the Dalmatian coast in Croatia. The negative bal-ance, in turn, consists mainly of regions which are origins of migration flows located in Central and Eastern Europe.