How many people live in Poland?
Demographics of Poland
According to the 2011 census by the Polish Central Statistical Office (GUS), at the end of 2011 Poland had a population of 38,538,447, which translates into an average population density of 123 people/km (urban 1105 per 1 km², rural 50 per 1 km²). 61.5% of the Polish population lives in urban areas, a number which is slowly diminishing. Poland is the 33rd most populous country in the world (9th in Europe, with 5.4% of the European population). Total population of Poland is almost stagnant (population growth was 0.08%). Average life expectancy was 70.5 for men and 78.9 for women. In 2009, it was expected to be 73.1 for men and 79.5 for women. Population distribution is uneven. Ethnically, Poland is a very homogeneous country, with 96.7% of population being Polish.
Tourism in Poland
Poland is a part of the global tourism market with constantly increasing number of visitors. Tourism in Poland contributes to the country's overall economy. The most popular cities are Kraków, Warsaw, Wrocław, Gdańsk, Poznań, Szczecin, Lublin, Toruń, Zakopane, the Salt Mine in Wieliczka and the historic site of Auschwitz – A German nazi concentration camp in Oświęcim. The best recreational destinations include Poland's Masurian Lake District, Baltic Sea coast, Tatra Mountains (the highest mountain range of Carpathians), Sudetes and Białowieża Forest. Poland's main tourist offers consist of sightseeing within cities and out-of-town historical monuments, business trips, qualified tourism, agrotourism, mountain hiking (trekking) and climbing among others.
Poland, especially after joining the European Union in 2004, became a place frequently visited by tourists. Most tourist attractions in Poland are connected with natural environment, historic sites and cultural events. They draw millions of tourists every year from all around the world. According to Tourist Institute's data, Poland was visited by 15.7 million tourists in 2006, and by 15 million tourists in 2007, out of the total number of 66.2 million foreign visitors. In 2012, Poland was visited by 13.5 million foreign tourists (those who came during Euro 2012, but did not stay overnight, were not included in official statistics). In 2013, Poland was visited by 15.8 million tourists. In 2016, the number of arrivals to Poland amounted to 80.5 million. 17.5 million of this number are arrivals considered for tourism purposes (with at least one night's stay).
Poland
As a result, the Polish Minister of Development Mateusz Morawiecki suggested that Poles abroad should return to Poland. Polish minorities are still present in the neighboring countries of Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania, as well as in other countries (see Poles for population numbers). Altogether, the number of ethnic Poles living abroad is estimated to be around 20 million. The largest number of Polonia can be found in the United States, Germany, United Kingdom and Canada.
Poles in Belarus
The Polish minority in Belarus numbers officially about 294,549 according to 2009 census. It forms the second largest ethnic minority in the country after the Russians, at 3.1% of the total population. An estimated 180,905 Belarusian Poles live in large agglomerations and 113,644 in smaller settlements, with the number of women exceeding the number of men by about 33,000. Some estimates by Polish non-governmental sources in the U.S. are higher, citing the previous poll held in 1989 under the Soviet authorities with 413,000 Poles recorded.
Poles in the Soviet Union
Polish communities were inherited from Imperial Russia after the creation of the Soviet Union. After World War I, Poland reestablished itself as an independent country, and its borders with the USSR were finalized by the Peace of Riga in 1921 at the end of the Polish-Soviet War, which left significant territories populated by Poles within the Soviet Union. According to the 1926 Soviet census, there were a total of 782,334 Poles in the USSR. The largest concentration of Poles was in West Ukraine, where according to the Soviet census in 1926 476,435 Poles lived. Those estimates are considered to have been lowered by Soviet officials. Church and independent estimates show estimates of 650,000 to 700,000 Poles living in that area. This suggests that the total Polish population of the USSR was in excess of 1,000,000.
Initially the Soviets pursued a policy where the local national language was used as a tool for eradication of national identity in favour of "communist education of masses". In the case of the Poles this meant a goal of Sovietisation of the Polish population. However this proved extremely difficult as the Soviet communists themselves realised that the Poles were en masse opposed to communist ideology, seeing it as hostile to Polish identity. The policy of religious discrimination, plunder and terror further strengthened Polish resistance to Soviet rule. As a result, the Soviet authorities started to imprison and forcefully remove all those seen as an obstacle to their policies. In a short time prisons in areas with a Polish minority were overcrowded by 600%.
History of the Ukrainian minority in Poland
Since 1989, there has been a new wave of Ukrainian immigration to Poland, mostly consisting of jobseekers.
According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, around 300,000 Ukrainian citizens work in Poland yearly. In recent years, the number of Ukrainian immigrants in Poland has grown considerably, numbering 1.3 million in 2016.
Kashubian language
The number of speakers of Kashubian varies widely from source to source, ranging from as low as 4,500 to the upper 366,000. In the 2011 census, over 108,000 people in Poland declared that they mainly use Kashubian at home, of these only 10 percent consider Kashubian to be their mother tongue, with the rest considering themselves to be native speakers of both Kashubian and Polish. The number of people who can speak at least some Kashubian is higher, around 366,000. All Kashubian speakers are also fluent in Polish. A number of schools in Poland use Kashubian as a teaching language. It is an official alternative language for local administration purposes in Gmina Sierakowice, Gmina Linia, Gmina Parchowo, Gmina Luzino and Gmina Żukowo in the Pomeranian Voivodeship. Most respondents say that Kashubian is used in informal speech among family members and friends. This is most likely because Polish is the official language and spoken in formal settings.
Administrative division of Polish territories during World War II
By the end of the Polish Defensive War the Soviet Union had taken over 52.1% of the territory of Poland (circa 200,000 km²), with over 13,700,000 people. The estimates vary; Professor Elżbieta Trela-Mazur gives the following numbers in regards to the ethnic composition of these areas: 38% Poles (ca. 5.1 million people), 37% Ukrainians, 14.5% Belarusians, 8.4% Jews, 0.9% Russians and 0.6% Germans. There were also 336,000 refugees from areas occupied by Germany, most of them Jews (198,000). Areas occupied by the USSR were annexed to Soviet territory, with the exception of area of Wilno, which was transferred to Lithuania, although soon attached to USSR, when Lithuania became a Soviet republic.
Territories of Poland annexed by the Soviet Union
On August 16, 1945 the Communist-dominated Polish government signed a treaty with the USSR to formally cede these territories. The total population of the territories annexed by the USSR, not including the portion returned to Poland in 1945, had an estimated population of 10,653,000 according to the 1931 Polish census. In 1939 this had increased to about 11.6 million. The composition by language group was Ukrainian 37.1%, Polish 36.5%, Belarusian 15.1%, Yiddish 8.3%, Other 3%. Religious affiliation: Eastern Orthodox 31.6%, Roman Catholic 30.1%, Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church 26.7%, Jewish 9.9%, Other 1.7%.
Poland
In 2014, an estimated 87% of the population belonged to the Catholic Church. Though rates of religious observance are lower at 52%, Poland remains one of the most religious countries in Europe. Contemporary religious minorities include Polish Orthodox (about 506,800), various Protestants (about 150,000) — including 77,500 Lutherans in the Evangelical-Augsburg Church, 23,000 Pentecostals in the Pentecostal Church in Poland, 10,000 Adventists in the Seventh-day Adventist Church and other smaller Evangelical denominations — Jehovah's Witnesses (126,827), Eastern Catholics, Mariavites, Jews, and Muslims, including the Tatars of Białystok region. There are also several thousand neopagans, some of whom are members of the Native Polish Church.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
At the Polish census of 2002, 96.7% of the people of Poland claimed Polish nationality, and 97.8% declare that they speak Polish at home. At the 2011 census, 1,44% of the 39 million inhabitants of Poland declared to be descendents of another single ancestry than Polish. That number includes 418,000 who declared to be Silesians as a national-ethnic identification (362,000 as single ethnicity and 391,000 a second ethnicity) and 17,000 Kashubians (16,000 as single ethnicity). Recognized minorities numbered 0,3% of the population: 49,000 Germans (26,000 single ethnicity), 36,000 Ukrainians (26,000 single ethnicity), 7,000 Lemkos (5,000 single ethnicity), 37,000 Belarusians (31,000 single ethnicity), 12,000 Roma people (9,000 single ethnicity), 8,000 Russians (5,000 single ethnicity). 0,2% of the population are foreign citizens.
History of Poland (1918–1939)
About a third of the total population were members of minorities, including five or six million Ukrainians, over three million Jews, one and a half million Belarusians, and some 800,000 Germans. These minorities were increasingly alienated, complaining that they were marginalized in politics and denied rights Poland had agreed to in treaties. Historian Peter D. Stachura has examined the ethnic issue in interwar Poland and summarizes the consensus of historians, he writes:
Polish People's Republic
The population of Jews in Poland, which formed the largest Jewish community in pre-war Europe at about 3.3 million people, was all but destroyed by 1945. Approximately 3 million Jews died of starvation in ghettos and labor camps, were slaughtered at the German Nazi extermination camps or by the Einsatzgruppen death squads. Between 40,000 and 100,000 Polish Jews survived the Holocaust in Poland, and another 50,000 to 170,000 were repatriated from the Soviet Union, and 20,000 to 40,000 from Germany and other countries. At its postwar peak, there were 180,000 to 240,000 Jews in Poland, settled mostly in Warsaw, Łódź, Kraków and Wrocław.
Lithuanian minority in Poland
The Lithuanian minority in Poland consists of 8,000 people (according to the Polish census of 2011) living chiefly in the Podlaskie Voivodeship in the north-eastern part of Poland. The Lithuanian embassy in Poland notes that there are about 15,000 people in Poland of Lithuanian ancestry.
Demographic history of Poland
Eventually the Lithuanian speakers came to be known as Samogitians (see also Samogitian nobility), after the province in which they were the dominant majority. Another estimate for the combined population at the beginning of the 16th century gives 7.5 million, roughly split evenly, due to much larger territory of the Grand Duchy (with about 10-15 people per square km in Poland and 3-5 people per square km in the Grand Duchy, and even less in the south-east Cossack borderlands). By 1500, about 15% of Poland's population lived in urban centers (settlements with over 500 people).
World War II casualties of Poland
The official Polish government report on war damages prepared in 1947 put Poland's war dead at 6,028,000; 3.0 million ethnic Poles and 3.0 million Jews not including losses of Polish citizens from the Ukrainian and Belarusian ethnic groups. This figure was disputed when the communist system collapsed by the Polish historian Czesław Łuczak who put total losses at 6.0 million; 3.0 million Jews, 2.0 million ethnic Poles, and 1.0 million Polish citizens from the other ethnic groups not included in the 1947 report on war damages. In 2009 the Polish government-affiliated Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) published the study ""Polska 1939–1945. Straty osobowe i ofiary represji pod dwiema okupacjami"" "(Poland 1939-1945. Human Losses and Victims of Repression Under the Two Occupations)" that estimated Poland's war dead at between 5.6 and 5.8 million Poles and Jews, including 150,000 during the Soviet occupation. Poland's losses by geographic area include about 3.5 million within the borders of present-day Poland, and about two million in the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union. Contemporary Russian sources include Poland's losses in the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union with Soviet war dead. In Poland this is viewed as inflating Soviet casualties at Poland's expense. Todays scholars of independent Poland believe that 1.8 to 1.9 million Polish civilians (non-Jews) and 3 million Polish Jews were victims of German Occupation policies and the war."
Most Polish citizens who perished in the war were civilian victims of the war crimes and crimes against humanity during the occupation by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. The Polish Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) estimates total deaths under the German occupation at 5,470,000 to 5,670,000 Jews and Poles, 2,770,000 Poles, 2.7 to 2.9 million Polish Jews According to IPN research there were also 150,000 victims of Soviet repression.Approximately three million Polish Jews were victims of the Holocaust. In 2009 the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) put the total of Jewish deaths at 2.7 to 2.9 million. Polish researchers estimate that 1,860,000 Polish Jews were murdered in the Nazi death camps, the remainder perished inside the Jewish ghettos in German-occupied Poland, aboard Holocaust trains, and in mass shooting actions. The Nazi extermination camp overall death toll is estimated at 2,830,000; including 1,860,000 Polish Jews: 490,000 killed at Belzec; 60,000 at Sobibor; 800,000 at Treblinka; 150,000 at Chełmno; 300,000 at Auschwitz; and 60,000 at Majdanek. An additional 660,000 Jews from other countries, were transported to Auschwitz and murdered. Over a million Jews deported from Western countries to camps and ghettos set up in occupied Poland perished in the Holocaust. The Nazi death camps located in Poland are sometimes incorrectly described as Polish death camps.According to the figures published by the Polish government in exile in 1941 the ethnic Polish population was 24,388,000 at the beginning of the war in September 1939. The IPN puts the death toll of ethnic Poles under the German occupation at 2,770,000 and 150,000 due to Soviet repression
Poland
Following the formation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569, the country over the next two centuries contained many languages, cultures and religions. The Commonwealth was primarily composed of three nations: Poles, Lithuanians, and Ruthenians (Ukrainians and Belarusians) — there were also sizable minorities of groups such as Germans, Jews, Latvians, Scots, Armenians, Mennonites and Tatars. After the partitions of Poland at the end of the 18th century, the bulk of the ethnic Polish population was primarily located in Congress Poland, and in the Galicia and Poznań provinces. When Poland regained its independence in 1918, Poles constituted the majority of the population in the country, during the interwar period, with sizable Ukrainian, Belarusian, Jewish and German minorities.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
There were 5,846 Lithuanians in Poland (5,639 Polish citizens), according to the 2002 census. They live in close concentrations, in Suwałki in the north-east of Poland, and in the territory of Puńsk Municipality (Gmina) where they constituted 74.4% of the inhabitants in 2002 (3,312 out of 4,454).
Humanae vitae and Poland
In the following years, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński campaigned hard against birth control and abortion, claiming that they are immoral and unnecessary since Poland was large enough to feed not only the existing thirty, but eighty million Poles. Gomułka replied publicly, asking the Church for miraculous means to solve the nation's food and economic problems especially in housing and employment.
United States of Poland
Paderewski's idea postulated rebuilding a Polish state as federation, in which constitution and law would guarantee equality to citizens, ethnic and religious groups. Territory would engulf most of pre-partitioned territory. Taking into account of that time population, the country would have 54 million citizens. On its head would be a President with a title of the King of Poland, Lithuania, Polesia and Halych.
Poland
Poland ( ), officially the Republic of Poland ( ), is a country located in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative subdivisions, covering an area of , and has a largely temperate seasonal climate. With a population of approximately 38.5 million people, Poland is the sixth most populous member state of the European Union. Poland's capital and largest metropolis is Warsaw. Other major cities include Kraków, Łódź, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk, and Szczecin.
Geography of Poland
Poland is a country in East-Central Europe with an area of 312,679 square kilometres (120,726 sq. mi.), and mostly temperate climate. Generally speaking, Poland is an almost unbroken plain reaching from the Baltic Sea in the north, to the Carpathian Mountains in the south. Within that plain, terrain variations run in bands east to west. 
The Baltic coast has two natural harbors, the larger one in the Gdańsk-Gdynia region, and a smaller one near Szczecin in the far northwest. The northeastern region, also known as the Masurian Lake District with more than 2,000 lakes, is densely wooded and sparsely populated. To the south of the lake district, and across central Poland a vast region of plains extends all the way to the Sudetes on the Czech and Slovak borders southwest, and to the Carpathians on the Czech, Slovak and Ukrainian borders southeast. The central lowlands had been formed by glacial erosion in the Pleistocene ice age. The neighboring countries are Germany to the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, and Lithuania and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad to the northeast.
Territories of Poland annexed by the Soviet Union
The "need to protect" the Ukrainian and Belarusian majority populations was used as a pretext for Soviet invasion of Eastern Poland (including Western Ukraine and Belarus) carried out in the wake of Poland's dismemberment under the Nazi invasion with Warsaw being besieged and Poland's government being in the process of evacuation. The total area, including the area given to Lithuania, was , with a population of 13.299 million, of which 5.274 million were ethnic Poles and 1.109 million were Jews. An additional 138,000 ethnic Poles and 198,000 Jews fled the German occupied zone and became refugees in the Soviet occupied region.
Polish census of 1931
This situation created a difficulty in establishing the true number of ethnic non-Polish citizens of Poland. Some authors used the language criterion to attempt to establish the actual number of minorities, which was difficult considering that over 707,000 people in Polesia declared that they spoke "local" rather than any other language. Other authors used approximation based on both language and declared religion. After World War II in Soviet bloc countries the interpretation of the census was used for political purposes, to underline the officially-supported thesis that pre-war Poland incorporated areas where the non-Polish population made up the majority of inhabitants. For this purpose some authors combined all non-Polish speakers in South-Eastern Poland (namely Ukrainians, Belarusians, Rusyns, Hutsuls, Lemkos, Boykos and Poleszuks) into one category of "Ruthenians"). In fact, the census had counted speakers of Belarusian, Ukrainian, Russian, and Ruthenian languages as separate categories According to Piotr Eberhardt "it is commonly agreed that the criterion of declared language led to an overestimation of the number of Poles" in the 1931 census, he noted that " Members of minority groups believe that the language criterion led to an overestimation of the number of Poles by about one million" Eberhardt believes that criterion of religion tended to be a better indication nationality, he pointed out that 381,000 Jews identified by religion were considered Poles according to the language spoken
Vietnamese people in Poland
Vietnamese people in Poland form one of the ethnic minorities in Poland. The Vietnamese-Polish community is the fourth-largest Vietnamese community in the European Union, after Vietnamese people in France, Vietnamese people in Germany and Vietnamese people in the Czech Republic, although its numbers are difficult to estimate, with common estimates ranging from 50,000 to 60,000. They are Poland's largest immigrant community whose culture is not European, and are often perceived by the Polish public as being one of the largest, if not the largest, minorities in Poland; the factual verification of that claim is difficult due to lack of precise data. While enjoying economic success and, along with other immigrants, perceived as a competition in the workforce, the Vietnamese community is regarded surprisingly positively in Poland. Virtually, xenophobia against Vietnamese population in Poland is irrelevant in comparison to rising anti-Arab and anti-Russian sentiment in Poland.
Kresy
In January, February and March 2012, Centre for Public Opinion Research made a survey, asking Poles about their ties to the Kresy. It turned out that almost 15% of the population of Poland (4,3 - 4,6 million people) declared that they either were born in the Kresy, or have a parent or a grandparent who comes from that region. The number of "Kresowiacy" is high in northern and western Poland – as many as 51% of inhabitants of Lubusz Voivodeship, and 47% of inhabitants of Lower Silesian Voivodeship stated that their family has ties to the Kresy. Furthermore, "Kresowiacy" now make 30% of the population of Opole Voivodeship, 25% of the population of West Pomeranian Voivodeship, and 18% of the population of Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship.
Polish diaspora
There are roughly 20 million people of Polish ancestry living outside Poland, making the Polish diaspora one of the largest in the world and one of the most widely dispersed. Reasons for the displacement include border shifts, forced expulsions, resettlement by voluntary and forced exiles as well as political and economic emigration. Major populations of Polish ancestry can be found in their native home region of Central Europe and in many other countries of Europe and also well in the Americas, Australasia and South Africa. There are also smaller Polish communities in most countries of Asia and Africa.
History of the Jews in Poland
According to the 1931 National Census there were 3,130,581 Polish Jews measured by the declaration of their religion. Estimating the population increase and the emigration from Poland between 1931 and 1939, there were probably 3,474,000 Jews in Poland as of 1 September 1939 (approximately 10% of the total population) primarily centered in large and smaller cities: 77% lived in cities and 23% in the villages. They made up about 50%, and in some cases even 70% of the population of smaller towns, especially in Eastern Poland. Prior to World War II, the Jewish population of Łódź numbered about 233,000, roughly one-third of the city’s population. The city of Lwów (now in Ukraine) had the third largest Jewish population in Poland, numbering 110,000 in 1939 (42%). Wilno (now in Lithuania) had a Jewish community of nearly 100,000, about 45% of the city's total. In 1938, Kraków's Jewish population numbered over 60,000, or about 25% of the city's total population. In 1939 there were 375,000 Jews in Warsaw or one third of the city's population. Only New York City had more Jewish residents than Warsaw.
History of Poland (1939–1945)
The new western and northern territories of Poland were repopulated with Poles "repatriated" from the eastern regions now in the Soviet Union (2–3 million people) and from other places. The precise Soviet-Polish border was delineated in the Polish–Soviet border agreement of 16 August 1945. The new Poland emerged 20% smaller (by 77,700 km² or 29,900 mi²) in comparison to the 1939 borders. Eastern poorly developed regions were lost and western industrialized regions were gained, but the emotional impact for many Poles was clearly negative. The population transfers included also the moving of the Ukrainians and the Belarusians from Poland into their respective Soviet republics. In particular, the Soviet and Polish communist authorities expelled between 1944 and 1947 nearly 700,000 Ukrainians and Lemkos, transferring most of them into Soviet Ukraine, and then spreading the remaining groups in the Polish Recovered Territories during the Operation Vistula, thus ensuring that postwar Poland would not have significant minorities or any minority concentrations to contend with. Thousands were killed in the attendant strife and violence. After the war, many displaced Poles and some of those living in Kresy, now in the Soviet Union, did not end up in Poland as reestablished in 1945. The population within the respective official Polish borders decreased from 35.1 million in 1939 to 23.7 million in 1946.
Polish census of 1931
The Polish census of 1931 or Second General Census in Poland () was the second census taken in sovereign Poland during the interwar period, performed on December 9, 1931 by the Main Bureau of Statistics. It established that Poland's population amounted to 32 million people (over 5 million more than in the previous census of 1921).
Polish diaspora
According to the 2002 census, 3,671 Poles live in Romania, mainly in the villages of the Suceava region (). There are even three exclusively Polish villages: "Nowy Sołoniec" (Soloneţu Nou), "Plesza" (Pleşa) and "Pojana Mikuli" (Poiana Micului). Poles in Romania form an officially recognised national minority and have one seat in the Chamber of Deputies of Romania (currently held by Ghervazen Longher) and access to Polish elementary schools and cultural centres (known as "Polish Houses").
Demographic history of Poland
Before World War II, a third of Poland's population was composed of ethnic minorities. After the war, however, Poland's minorities were mostly gone, due to the 1945 revision of borders, and the Holocaust. Under the National Repatriation Office ("Państwowy Urząd Repatriacyjny"), millions of Poles were forced to leave their homes in the eastern Kresy region and settle in the western former German territories. At the same time approximately 5 million remaining Germans (about 8 million had already fled or had been expelled and about 1 million had been killed in 1944-46) were similarly expelled from those territories into the Allied occupation zones. Ukrainian and Belarusian minorities found themselves now mostly within the borders of the Soviet Union; those who opposed this new policy (like the Ukrainian Insurgent Army in the Bieszczady Mountains region) were suppressed by the end of 1947 in the Operation Vistula.
World War II casualties of Poland
In the aftermath of the September 1939 German and Soviet invasion of Poland, the territory of Poland was divided between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (USSR). The Soviet occupied territories of Poland, with total population of 13.0 million, was subjected to a reign of terror. According to research published in 2009 by the Institute of National Remembrance about 1.0 million Polish citizens from all ethnic groups were arrested, conscripted or deported by the Soviet occupiers from 1939 to 1941; including about 200,000 Polish military personnel held as prisoners of war; 100,000 Polish citizens were arrested and imprisoned by the Soviets, including civic officials, military personnel and other "enemies of the people" like the clergy and Polish educators; 475,000 Poles who were considered "enemies of the people" were deported to remote regions of the USSR; 76,000 Polish citizens were conscripted into the Soviet Armed forces and 200,000 were conscripted as forced laborers in the interior of the Soviet Union. When the Soviet forces returned to Poland in 1944-1945 there was a new wave of repression of Polish citizens from all ethnic groups including 188,000 deported, 50,000 conscripted as forced labor and 50,000 arrested.
Demographic history of Poland
Around 1490, the combined population of Poland and Lithuania, in a personal union (the Polish–Lithuanian union) since the Union of Krewo a century before, is estimated at about 8 million. An estimate for 1493 gives the combined population of Poland and Lithuania at 7.5 million, breaking them down by ethnicity at 3.25 million Poles, 3.75 million Ruthenians and 0.5 million Lithuanians. The Ruthenians composed most of the population of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania: this is the reason that the late GDL is often called a Slavic country, alongside Poland, Russia etc. In time, the adjective "Lithuanian" came to denote a Slav of the Grand Duchy.
Outline of Poland
The Republic of Poland is a sovereign country located in Central Europe. Poland is bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north. The total area of Poland is 312,679 km² (120,728 sq mi), making it the 69th largest country in the world and 9th in Europe. Poland has a population of over 38.5 million people, which makes it the 33rd most populous country in the world.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
There are 12,731 Romani in Poland, according to the 2002 census. They are dispersed and live on the area of the whole country, although their more numerous concentrations are in the south of Poland.
Demographic history of Poland
Deaths Due to German Occupation
Poles-The Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) figure for deaths of Poles due the German occupation is 2,770,000. This figure includes "Direct War Losses" -543,000; "Murdered in Camps and in Pacification" -506,000; "Deaths in prisons and Camps" 1,146,000; "Deaths outside of prisons and Camps" 473,000; "Murdered in Eastern Regions" 100,000; "Deaths in other countries" 2,000. These figures include about 200,000 Polish speaking Jews who are considered Poles in Polish sources.
Poland
Germany killed 2.9 million Polish Jews, and 2.8 million ethnic Poles, including Polish academics, doctors, lawyers, nobility, priests and others. It is estimated that, of pre-war Poland's Jewry, approximately 90% were killed. Throughout the occupation, many members of the Armia Krajowa, supported by the Polish government in exile, and millions of ordinary Poles – at great risk to themselves and their families – engaged in rescuing Jews from the Nazi Germans. Grouped by nationality, Poles represent the largest number of people who rescued Jews during the Holocaust. To date, 6,620 Poles have been awarded the title of "Righteous Among the Nations" by the State of Israel–more than any other nation. Some estimates put the number of Poles involved in rescue efforts at up to 3 million, and credit Poles with sheltering up to 450,000 Jews.
Polish People's Republic
According to the national census, which took place on February 14, 1946, population of Poland was 23,9 million, out of which 32% lived in cities and towns, and 68% lived in the countryside. The 1950 census (December 3, 1950) showed the population rise to 25 million, and the 1960 census (December 6, 1960) placed the population of Poland at 29.7 million. In 1950, Warsaw was again the biggest city, with the population of 804,000 inhabitants. Second was Lodz (pop. 620,000), then Kraków (pop. 344,000), Poznań (pop. 321,000), and Wrocław (pop. 309,000).
Poles
Prior to World War II, a third of Poland's population was composed of ethnic minorities. Following the war, however, Poland's minorities were mostly gone, due to the 1945 revision of borders, and the Holocaust. Most notably, the population of Jews in Poland, which formed the largest Jewish community in pre-war Europe at about 3 million people, was almost completely annihilated by 1945.
Demographic history of Poland
10. Population December 1950 Per Census The total population per the December 1950 census was 25 million. A breakdown by ethnic group was not given. However, we can estimate the Jewish population based on the postwar census taken by the Jewish community.Data for the Germans and others who remained in Poland after the war can be estimated using the 1946 Polish census
Polish property bubble
In early 2007, it can be argued that the Polish property market began to show the early signs of a property bubble: 
As of 2013, house prices in Poland have been falling since mid-2008. Compared to pre-crisis peaks: 
The arguments for further real estate price rises or stabilization are:
In addition, Warsaw has a population of only 2 million people – approximately 5% of the whole of the country – which is very low for a capital city. Poland is also one of many countries with a rather high house price to income ratio (13.58) and an estimated rental profitability between 3.92% to 4.31% for residential units.
Rescue of Jews by Poles during the Holocaust
Before World War II, 3,300,000 Jewish people lived in Poland – ten percent of the general population of some 33 million. Poland was the center of the European Jewish world.
German minority in Poland
According to the 2002 census, most of the Germans in Poland (92.9%) live in Silesia: 104,399 in the Opole Voivodeship, i.e. 71.0% of all Germans in Poland and a share of 9.9% of the local population; 30,531 in the Silesian Voivodeship, i.e. 20.8% of all Germans in Poland and 0.6% of the local population; plus 1,792 in the Lower Silesian Voivodeship, i.e. 1.2% of all Germans in Poland, though only 0.06% of the local population. A second region with a notable German minority is Masuria, with 4,311 living in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, corresponding to 2.9% of all Germans in Poland, and 0.3% of the local population.
Ukrainians in Poland
The total of 27,172 people declared Ukrainian nationality in the Polish census of 2002. Most of them lived in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship (11,881), followed by West Pomeranian (3,703), Podkarpackie (2,984) and Pomeranian Voivodeship (2,831). Some Lemkos (recognized in Poland as distinct ethnic group) regard themselves as members of the Ukrainian nation, while others distance themselves from Ukrainians.
Partitions of Poland
The Russian part included and 1.2 million people with Vilnius, the Prussian part (new provinces of New East Prussia and New Silesia) and 1 million people with Warsaw, and the Austrian with 1.2 million and Lublin and Kraków.
Romani people in Poland
According to the Polish census of 2011, 17049 people in Poland declared themselves as Romani people.
Polish People's Republic
The Polish People's Republic (, ) was a state in Central Europe that existed from 1947 to 1989, and the predecessor of the modern democratic Republic of Poland. With a population of approximately 37.9 million inhabitants near the end of its existence, it was the most populous state of the Eastern Bloc after the Soviet Union. Having a unitary Marxist–Leninist communist government, it was also one of the main signatories of the Warsaw Pact. The official capital since 1947 and largest city was Warsaw, followed by industrial Łódź and cultural Kraków.
Second Polish Republic
Historically, Poland was a nation of many nationalities. This was especially true after independence was regained in the wake of World War I and the subsequent Polish–Soviet War ending at Peace of Riga. The census of 1921 shows 30.8% of the population consisted of ethnic minorities, compared with a share of 1.6% (solely identifying with a non-Polish ethnic group) or 3.8% (including those identifying with both the Polish ethnicity and with another ethnic group) in 2011. The first spontaneous flight of about 500,000 Poles from the Soviet Union occurred during the reconstitution of sovereign Poland. In the second wave, between November 1919 and June 1924 some 1,200,000 people left the territory of the USSR for Poland. It is estimated that some 460,000 of them spoke Polish as the first language. According to the 1931 Polish Census: 68.9% of the population was Polish, 13.9% were Ukrainian, around 10% Jewish, 3.1% Belarusian, 2.3% German and 2.8% other, including Lithuanian, Czech, Armenian, Russian, and Romani. The situation of minorities was a complex subject and changed during the period.
Poland was also a nation of many religions. In 1921, 16,057,229 Poles (approx. 62.5%) were Roman (Latin) Catholics, 3,031,057 citizens of Poland (approx. 11.8%) were Eastern Rite Catholics (mostly Ukrainian Greek Catholics and Armenian Rite Catholics), 2,815,817 (approx. 10.95%) were Greek Orthodox, 2,771,949 (approx. 10.8%) were Jewish, and 940,232 (approx. 3.7%) were Protestants (mostly Lutheran).
World War II casualties of Poland
The Polish government estimate of war dead in 1947 was based on the results of the 1931 Polish census using the criterion of language spoken to breakout the various ethnic groups. The classification of the ethnic groups in Poland during the Second Polish Republic is a disputed topic, Tadeusz Piotrowski called the 1931 Polish census "unreliable", noting that it had underestimated the number of non-Poles The official figures for nationality from the 1931 Polish census based on the mother tongue put the percentage of ethnic Poles at 68.9%, Jews 8.6% and other minority groups 22.5%., Tadeusz Piotrowski maintains that the adjusted census figures(taking religious affiliation into account) put the percentage of ethnic Poles at 64.7%, Jews 9.8% and other minority groups 25.5% of Poland's population. Based on the analysis by Tadeusz Piotrowski roughly 1.0 million Ukrainians and Belarusians and 400,000 Polish speaking Jews were misclassified as Poles in the official figures for the 1939 population. Polish demographer Piotr Eberhardt maintains that it is commonly agreed that the criterion of declared language to classify ethnic groups led to an overestimation of the number of Poles in pre-war Poland. He notes that in general, the numbers declaring a particular language do not mesh with the numbers declaring the corresponding nationality. Members of ethnic minority groups believe that the language criterion led to an overestimation of Poles.
Poland
Poland, with its 38,544,513 inhabitants, has the eighth-largest population in Europe and the sixth-largest in the European Union. It has a population density of 122 inhabitants per square kilometer (328 per square mile).
History of the Jews in Poland
The number of Jews in Poland on 1 September 1939, amounted to about 3,474,000 people. One hundred thirty thousand soldiers of Jewish descent, including Boruch Steinberg, Chief Rabbi of the Polish Military, served in the Polish Army at the outbreak of the Second World War, thus being among the first to launch armed resistance against Nazi Germany. During the September Campaign some 20,000 Jewish civilians and 32,216 Jewish soldiers were killed, while 61,000 were taken prisoner by the Germans; the majority did not survive. The soldiers and non-commissioned officers who were released ultimately found themselves in the Nazi ghettos and labor camps and suffered the same fate as other Jewish civilians in the ensuing Holocaust in Poland.
In 1939, Jews constituted 30% of Warsaw's population. With the coming of the war, Jewish and Polish citizens of Warsaw jointly defended the city, putting their differences aside. Polish Jews later served in almost all Polish formations during the entire World War II, many were killed or wounded and very many were decorated for their combat skills and exceptional service. Jews fought with the Polish Armed Forces in the West, in the Soviet formed Polish People's Army as well as in several underground organizations and as part of Polish partisan units or Jewish partisan formations.
Unemployment in Poland
Unemployment in Poland is higher among the youth. It has risen to over 25% in 2011 and as of March 2014 is at 26.3%, and is higher than the OECD average of 16.3%. One of the consequences of unemployment being particularly high among the young has been a relatively high rate of youth emigration to other European countries, estimated in 2014 as 2 million (out of Poland's approximately 40 million population).
Timeline of Jewish-Polish history
1897 The first Russian census numbers 5,200,000 Jews plus 4,900,000 in the Pale. The Kingdom of Poland has 1,300,000 Jews or 14% of its population.
Vietnamese people in Poland
There are no precise data on the number of Vietnamese people in Poland, as many, likely at least 50%, are illegal immigrants. The Polish census of 2011 had 4,027 respondents indicate Vietnamese as their nationality. The Vietnamese embassy and Vietnamese community leaders in Poland estimate that about 20,000 to 30,000 Vietnamese people may reside in Poland, though the Polish government in 2002 put the upper possible range at about 50,000. A 2008 Polish government report gave the range of 25,000–60,000, a 2012 media report also suggested an upper range of 60,000, while a 2014 academic paper provided an estimate of 35,000, with a note that this number is "hard to estimate". As they are Poland's largest immigrant community whose culture is not European, they are also one of Poland's most visible immigrant groups. Members of the Polish public commonly hold the mistaken belief that Vietnamese form Poland's largest foreign community, a title which in fact belongs to migrants from the former USSR.
Polish Australians
In 2006 52,254 Australian residents declared they were born in Poland. Cities with the largest Polish populations were Melbourne (16,439), Sydney (12,514), Adelaide (5,859) and Perth (5,142).
The Holocaust in Poland
The Republic of Poland was a multicultural country before the Second World War broke out, with almost a third of its population originating from the minority groups: 13.9 percent Ukrainians; 10 percent Jews; 3.1 percent Belarusians; 2.3 percent Germans and 3.4 percent Czechs, Lithuanians and Russians. Soon after the 1918 reconstitution of an independent Polish state, about 500,000 refugees from the Soviet republics came to Poland in the first spontaneous flight from persecution especially in Ukraine (see, Pale of Settlement) where up to 2,000 pogroms took place during the Civil War. In the second wave of immigration, between November 1919 and June 1924 some 1,200,000 people left the territory of the USSR for new Poland. It is estimated that some 460,000 refugees spoke Polish as the first language. Between 1933 and 1938, around 25,000 German Jews fled Nazi Germany to sanctuary in Poland.
History of Poland (1939–1945)
About 13.4 million Polish citizens lived in the areas seized by the Soviet Union. Of those, about 8.7 million were Ukrainians, Belarusians and Jews. The minorities' relations with the Polish authorities were generally bad and many of their members greeted and supported the arriving Red Army troops as liberators. The British and French responses to the "not unexpected" Soviet encroachment were muted.
Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
The Commonwealth comprised various identities: Poles, Lithuanians, Czechs, Hungarians, Slovaks, Ruthenians (Belarusians and Ukrainians), and Vlachs (Romanians). Sometimes inhabitants of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were called Litvins, a Slavic term for people from Lithuania, regardless of their ethnicity (with the exception of Jews, who were called Litvaks). Shortly after the Union of Lublin in 1569, the Commonwealth's population was around 7 million, with roughly of 4.5 million Poles, 750,000 Lithuanians, 700,000 Jews and 2 million Ruthenians. In 1618, after the Truce of Deulino, the Commonwealth population increased together with its territory, reaching 12 million people, which was composed roughly of 4.5 million Poles, 3.5 million Ukrainians, 1.5 million Belarusians, 750,000 Lithuanians, 750,000 Old Prussians, 500,000 Jews, and 500,000 Livonians. At that time nobility was 10% of the population, and burghers were 15%. The average population density per square kilometer was: 24 in Mazovia, 23 in Lesser Poland, 19 in Great Poland, 12 in Lublin palatinate, 10 in the Lvov area, 7 in Podolia and Volhynia, and 3 in the Ukraine. There was a tendency for the people from the more densely inhabited western territories to migrate eastwards. In the period from 1648 to 1657, populations losses are estimated at 4 m. Coupled with further population and territorial losses, in 1717 the Commonwealth population had fallen to 9 m, with roughly 4.5 m/50% Poles, 1.5 m/17% Ukrainians, 1.2 m Belarusians, 0.8 m Lithuanians, 0.5 m Jews, and 0.5 m others. Just before the first partition of Poland, the Commonwealth's population stood at some 14 million, including around 1 million nobles, 4.7 million Uniates and 400,000 Orthodox Christians. In 1792, the population was around 11 million and included 750,000 nobles.
Poles
The term "Polonia" is usually used in Poland to refer to people of Polish origin who live outside Polish borders, officially estimated at around 10 to 20 million. There is a notable Polish diaspora in the United States, Brazil, and Canada. France has a historic relationship with Poland and has a relatively large Polish-descendant population. Poles have lived in France since the 18th century. In the early 20th century, over a million Polish people settled in France, mostly during world wars, among them Polish émigrés fleeing either Nazi occupation or later Soviet rule.
Greece–Poland relations
Greek-Polish relations are relations between Greece and Poland. Both countries are full members of the European Union, OECD, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and NATO. There are over 3,000 people of Greek descent living in Poland, and over 20,000 people of Polish descent living in Greece.
Occupation of Poland (1939–1945)
Poland had a large Jewish population, and according to Davies, more Jews were both killed and rescued in Poland, than in any other nation, the rescue figure usually being put at between 100,000 and 150,000. Thousands of Poles have been honoured as Righteous Among the Nations – constituting the largest national contingent. When AK Home Army Intelligence discovered the true fate of transports leaving the Jewish Ghetto, the Council to Aid Jews ("Zegota") was established in late 1942, in cooperation with church groups. The organisation saved thousands. Emphasis was placed on protecting children, as it was nearly impossible to intervene directly against the heavily guarded transports. The Germans implemented several different laws to separate Poles and Jews in the ghettos with Poles living on the "Aryan Side" and the Jews living on the "Jewish Side", despite the risk of death many Poles risked their lives by forging "Aryan Papers" for Jews to make them appear as non-Jewish Poles so they could live on the Aryan side and avoid Nazi persecution. Another law implemented by the Germans was that Poles were forbidden from buying from Jewish shops in which, if they did, they were subject to execution. Jewish children were also distributed among safe houses and church networks. Jewish children were often placed in church orphanages and convents.
History of the Jews in 20th-century Poland
Following the re-emergence of sovereign Poland after World War I and during the interwar period the number of Jews in the country grew rapidly. According to the Polish national census of 1921, there were 2,845,364 Jews living in the Second Polish Republic; by late 1938 that number had grown by over 16 percent, to approximately 3,310,000, mainly through migration from Ukraine and the Soviet Russia. The average rate of permanent settlement was about 30,000 per annum. At the same time, every year around 100,000 Jews were passing through Poland in unofficial emigration overseas. Between the end of the Polish–Soviet War of 1919 and late 1938, the Jewish population of the Republic grew by nearly half a million, or over 464,000 persons. Jews preferred to live in relatively tolerant Poland rather than in the USSR, and continued to integrate, to marry into Polish Gentile families, to bring them into their community through marriage, to feel Polish and to form an important part of Polish society. Between 1933 and 1938, around 25,000 German Jews fled Nazi Germany to sanctuary in Poland.
Territories of Poland annexed by the Soviet Union
17 days after the German invasion of Poland in 1939, which marked the beginning of the Second World War, the Soviet Union invaded the eastern regions of Poland (known as the ""Kresy""), which Poland re-established during the Polish–Soviet War, and annexed territories totaling with a population of 13,299,000. Inhabitants besides ethnic Poles included Czech, Lithuanian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Jewish, and other minority groups.
Demographics of Poland
The population of Poland decreased by about six million due to the losses sustained during the Holocaust and German occupation during World War II (1939-1945), and Poland became one of the most ethnically homogeneous areas in Europe (next to the populations of Slovakia and the Czech Republic) as a result of radically altered borders and population expulsions at the end of and after the war. The post-war population movements were accompanied by two waves of forced migrations ordered by the Soviet and Polish communist authorities, including the transfers of sizable Polish populations (1944-1946) from the pre-war territories of Eastern Poland, which today form parts of Lithuania, of Belarus and of Ukraine, the transfer of ethnic Ukrainians back to the USSR (1944-1946), and the expulsion of Germans (1945-1950) to Germany from German provinces which fell into the Soviet Zone of Occupation and which the Soviets then awarded to the communist government in Poland.
World War II casualties of Poland
D. According to Bajer's calculations the number of Polish citizens on the Volksliste was 2,224,000. (200,000 were conscripted into the German Armed Forces, 937,000 were ethnic Germans, 272,000 were Poles involved in the Polish resistance and 815,000 were not involved in the resistance movement.)
Kraków
Kraków had a recorded population of 767,348 in 2017. According to the 2006 data, the population of Kraków comprised about 2% of the population of Poland and 23% of the population of the Lesser Poland Voivodeship. Selected demographic indicators are presented in a table (below), compiled on the basis of only the population living in Kraków permanently. The larger metropolitan area of the city encompasses a territory in which (in 2010) 1,393,893 inhabitants live.
Greater Poland
Greater Poland comprises much of the area drained by the Warta River and its tributaries, including the Noteć River. The region is distinguished from Lesser Poland with the lowland landscape, and from both Lesser Poland and Mazovia with its numerous lakes. In the strict meaning, it covers an area of about , and has a population of 3.5 million. In the wider sense, it has almost , and 7 million inhabitants.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
At the 2002 census there were 5,863 persons (5,850 Polish citizens who declared themselves Lemkos, and 62 Rusyns) all Polish citizens. At the 2011 census, there were 7,000 Lemkos (first declared ethnicity) and 10,000 including those who declared Lemko as second ethnicity.
Rescue of Jews by Catholics during the Holocaust
Poland had the largest Jewish population in Europe before World War II. There were 3,500,000 Jews living in the Second Republic, about 10% of the general population. Between the German invasion of Poland in 1939, and the end of World War II, over 90% of Polish Jewry perished. Nevertheless, more Jews were rescued by Catholic Poles, than in any other nation. According to Davies, the number of Jews saved by Poles is conservatively estimated at 100,000–150,000. The number of sheltered Jews according to Lukas was "as high as 450,000" at one time. Professor Tomasz Strzembosz put the total number of Catholic Poles saving Jews at 1 million. Among the 108 Martyrs of World War II beatified in 1999 by Pope John Paul II, prominent place belongs to religious people murdered by Nazi Germany for saving Jews. Several hundred Christian Poles were summarily shot in open pits for sheltering Jews in the vicinity of the Słonim Ghetto along with their priest, Adam Sztark "". Sisters of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary were arrested and executed the following day for hiding Jewish children in their convent. Marta Kazimiera Wołowska "", the superior of the convent, and Ewa Bogumiła Noiszewska "", a doctor, were beatified by Pope John Paul II together with priest Adam Sztark. They were killed at the same time. In 2001, Sztark became the first Jesuit ever awarded the title of Righteous Among the Nations by the state of Israel. He used to deliver food to the ghetto, purchased with cash donations from his parishioners. He also issued false certificates, personally sheltered Jewish refugees, and called upon all his congregation to help to save the ghetto residents.
Warsaw
Warsaw ( ; see also other names) is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the Vistula River in east-central Poland and its population is officially estimated at 1.765 million residents within a greater metropolitan area of 3.1 million residents, which makes Warsaw the 8th most-populous capital city in the European Union. The city limits cover , while the metropolitan area covers . Warsaw is an alpha global city, a major international tourist destination, and a significant cultural, political and economic hub. Its historical Old Town was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Protestantism in Poland
Protestantism in Poland is the third largest faith in Poland, after the Roman Catholic Church (32,910,865) and the Polish Orthodox Church (504,400). As of 2011 there were approximately 80 registered Protestant denominations in Poland, with a total of 145,600 members. Most Protestants (mainly Lutherans) in the country live in historically Protestant regions such as Cieszyn Silesia and Warmia-Masuria and in major urban areas. However, almost all urban and rural areas in Poland are predominantly Roman Catholic. The only town in the country with a majority Protestant population is Wisła.
Demographic history of Poland
The population of the Commonwealth of both nations was never overwhelmingly either Roman Catholic or Polish. This resulted from Poland's possession of Ukraine and federation with Lithuania; in both these countries ethnic Poles were a distinct minority. The Commonwealth comprised primarily three nations: Poles, Lithuanians, and Ukrainians and Belarusians (the latter two usually referred to together as Ruthenians). Shortly after the Union of Lublin (1569), at the turn of the 16th to 17th century, the Commonwealth population was around 7 million, with a rough breakdown of 4.5m Poles, 0.75m Lithuanians, 0.7m Jews and 2m Ruthenians. In 1618, after the Truce of Deulino the Commonwealth population increased together with its territory, reaching 12 millions that could be roughly divided into: Poles - 4.5m, Ukrainians - 3.5m, Belarusians - 1.5m, Lithuanians - 0.75m, Prussians - 0.75m, Jews - 0.5m, Livionians - 0.5m; at that time nobility formed 10% and burghers, 15%. Population losses of 1648-1667 are estimated at 4m. Coupled with further population and territorial losses, by 1717 the Commonwealth population had fallen to 9m: roughly 4.5m Poles, 1.5m Ukrainians, 1.2m Belarusians, 0.8m Lithuanians, 0.5m Jews, 0.5m others The urban population was hit hard, falling to below 10%.
Poles in the Soviet Union
The number of Poland's citizens held captive in the Soviet Union is a matter of dispute, and ranges from over 300,000 up to nearly 2 million, according to various sources. On March 30, 2004, the head of the Archival Service of Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, General Vasili Khristoforov gave alleged exact numbers of deported Poles. According to him, in 1940 exactly 297,280 Poles were deported, in June 1941 another 40,000. These numbers do not include P.O.W.s, prisoners, small groups, people arrested trying to cross the new borders, people who voluntarily moved into the USSR, and men drafted into the Red Army and into construction battalions or "stroybats".
History of Poland
The population grew steadily, reaching 35 million in 1939. However, the overall economic situation in the interwar period was one of stagnation. There was little money for investment inside Poland, and few foreigners were interested in investing there. Total industrial production barely increased between 1913 and 1939 (within the area delimited by the 1939 borders), but because of population growth (from 26.3 millions in 1919 to 34.8 millions in 1939), the "per capita" output actually decreased by 18%.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
Poland was also a nation of many religions. In 1921, 16,057,229 Poles (approx. 62.5%) were Roman (Latin) Catholics, 3,031,057 citizens of Poland (approx. 11.8%) were Eastern Rite Catholics (mostly Ukrainian Greek Catholics and Armenian Rite Catholics), 2,815,817 (approx. 10.95%) were Greek Orthodox, 2,771,949 (approx. 10.8%) were Jewish, and 940,232 (approx. 3.7%) were Protestants (mostly Lutheran). By 1931 Poland had the second largest Jewish population in the world, with one-fifth of all the world's Jews residing within its borders (approx. 3,136,000).
Ukrainians in Poland
The Ukrainian minority in Poland (, "Ukrayintsi", ) was composed of approximately 51,000 people (including 11,451 without Polish citizenship), according to the Polish census of 2011. Some 38,000 respondents named Ukrainian as their first identity (28,000 as their sole identity), 13,000 as their second identity, and 21,000 declared Ukrainian identity jointly with Polish nationality.
History of the Germans in Poland
The remaining German minority in Poland (152,897 people were registered in the 2002 census) enjoys minority rights according to Polish minority law. There are German speakers throughout Poland, and most of the Germans live in the Opole Voivodship in Silesia. Bilingual signs are posted in some towns of the region. In addition, there are bilingual schools and German can be used instead of Polish in dealings with officials in several towns.
Soviet partisans
After the German invasion of Poland in 1939, which marked the beginning of World War II, the Soviet Union invaded the eastern regions of the Second Polish Republic (referred to as the "Kresy") and annexed the lands totalling with a population of 13,299,000 inhabitants including ethnic Belarusians, Ukrainians, Poles, Jews, Czechs and others. Belarusian emigre sources said that the actual number of Belarusians in Poland in 1931 was over 3.4 million or 77.9 percent of the total population in West Belarus. A Ukrainian geographer concluded that out of 9,198,000 people living in western Ukraine (Galicia and Volhynia), Ukrainians amounted to 64.5 percent. Soviet era sources state that in 1939, Soviet forces took control of regions of the Polish Republic that had "a population of more than 12 million, including more than 6 million Ukrainians and about 3 million Belarusians."
Demographic estimates of the flight and expulsion of Germans
A 2005 study in Poland reported the data of Polish government indicated that about 4 million Germans remained on Polish territory in mid-1945, out of the pre-war population of about 10 million. The remaining balance were killed in the war, held as POWs or had fled to Germany in the final months of the war. By 1950, about three million persons had been deported from Poland and 1.1 million persons were verified as Polish citizens.
Poles in the United Kingdom
In Northern Ireland, the number of people reporting in the 2011 census that they were born in Poland was 19,658, and the number stating that they spoke Polish as a first language was 17,700. Despite a Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) recruitment drive in November 2006 that attracted 968 applications from Poles, with language exams being held both in Northern Ireland and in Warsaw, , none had entered the PSNI's ranks. The first Polish national to join the PSNI started working in August 2010.
Economy of Poland
Poland, especially after joining the European Union in 2004, became a place frequently visited by tourists. Most tourist attractions in Poland are connected with natural environment, historic sites and cultural events. They draw millions of tourists every year from all around the world. According to Tourist Institute's data, Poland was visited by 15.7 million tourists in 2006, and by 15 million tourists in 2007, out of the total number of 66.2 million foreign visitors. In 2016 the number of arrivals to Poland amounted to 80.5 million. 17.5 million of this number are arrivals considered for tourism purposes (with at least one night's stay), making it the 16th most visited country in the world. The most popular cities are Kraków, Warsaw, Wrocław, Gdańsk, Poznań, Szczecin, Lublin, Toruń, Sopot, Zakopane and the Wieliczka Salt Mine. The best recreational destinations include Poland's Masurian Lake District, Baltic Sea coast, Tatra Mountains (the highest mountain range of Carpathians), Sudetes and Białowieża Forest. Poland's main tourist offers consist of sightseeing within cities and out-of-town historical monuments, business trips, qualified tourism, agrotourism, mountain hiking (trekking) and climbing among others.
Congress Poland
Originally, the Kingdom had an area of roughly 128,500 km and a population of approximately 3.3 million. The new state would be one of the smallest Polish states ever, smaller than the preceding Duchy of Warsaw and much smaller than the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth which had a population of 10 million and an area of 1 million km. Its population reached 6.1 million by 1870 and 10 million by 1900. Most of the ethnic Poles in the Russian Empire lived in the Congress Kingdom, although some areas outside it also contained a Polish majority.
Demographic history of Poland
Included in the Polish figures of war dead are 2.0 million Polish citizens in the Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union Contemporary Russian sources also include these losses with Soviet war deaths.
Demographic history of Poland
7. Population gain Recovered Territories Germans remaining in Poland after the war in the Recovered Territories. This group included 1,130,000 bi-lingual Polish-German persons who declared their allegiance to Poland. Also remaining in 1950 were 94,000 German nationals, 36,000 Germans from pre-war Danzig and 1,500 ethnic Germans of other nations. Most of this group emigrated to Germany after 1956. The ethnic German population remaining in the 1990s was about 300,000.
History of the Jews in Poland
The number of Jews immigrating to Poland from Ukraine and Soviet Russia during the interwar period grew rapidly. Jewish population in the area of former Congress of Poland increased sevenfold between 1816 and 1921, from around 213,000 to roughly 1,500,000. According to the Polish national census of 1921, there were 2,845,364 Jews living in the Second Polish Republic; but, by late 1938 that number had grown by over 16% to approximately 3,310,000. The average rate of permanent settlement was about 30,000 per annum. At the same time, every year around 100,000 Jews were passing through Poland in unofficial emigration overseas. Between the end of the Polish–Soviet War and late 1938, the Jewish population of the Republic had grown by over 464,000.
History of Poland (1945–1989)
Before World War II, a third of Poland's population was composed of ethnic minorities. Poland had about 35 million inhabitants in 1939, but fewer than 24 million in 1946, within the respective borders. Of the remaining population over three million were ethnic minorities, such as Germans, Ukrainians and Jews, most of whom would soon leave Poland. Poland suffered the heaviest proportionate human losses during World War II, amounting to 16–17 percent of its population. It is estimated that up to 6 million Polish citizens died from war-related causes between 1939 and 1945. The approximate figure includes 3 million Jewish-Polish victims as part of the above total. The number of ethnically Polish victims was perhaps 2 million.
Demographics of Poland
Like many developed nations, Poland is ageing. In 1950, the median age was 25.8: half of the Polish population was younger, half older. Today it is 38.2. If current trends continue, it may be 51 by 2050. As the population is ageing, it also started to decline in the 1990s mainly due to low birth rates and continued emigration which impacted the economy, however this has started to change. The number of children born in Polish families (TFR of 1.31, down from 2 in 1990) is one of the lowest in Central Europe, but has started to improve in recent years.
Demographic history of Poland
The population of Jews in Poland, which formed the largest Jewish community in pre-war Europe at about 3.3 million people, was all but destroyed by 1945. Approximately 3 million Jews died of starvation in ghettos and labor camps, were slaughtered at the German Nazi extermination camps or by the Einsatzgruppen death squads. Between 40,000 and 100,000 Polish Jews survived the Holocaust in Poland, and another 50,000 to 170,000 were repatriated from the Soviet Union, and 20,000 to 40,000 from Germany and other countries. At its postwar peak, there were 180,000 to 240,000 Jews in Poland, settled mostly in Warsaw, Łódź, Kraków and Wrocław.
Polish Americans
The U.S. Census asked Polish immigrants to specify Polish as their native language beginning in Chicago in 1900, allowing the government to enumerate them as an individual nationality when there was no Polish nation-state. No distinction is made in the American census between ethnically Polish Americans and descendants of non-ethnic Poles, such as Jews or Ukrainians, who were born in the territory of Poland and considered themselves Polish nationals. Therefore, some say, of the 10 million Polish Americans, only a certain portion are of Polish ethnic descent. On the other hand, many ethnic Poles when entering the US from 1795 to 1917, when Poland did not exist, did not identify themselves as ethnic Poles and instead identified themselves as either German, Austrian or Russian (this pertained to the nations occupying Poland from 1795 to 1917). Therefore, the actual number of Americans of at least partial Polish ancestry, could be well over 10 million. In the 2011 United States Census Bureau's Population Estimates, there are between 9,365,239 and 9,530,571 Americans of Polish descent, with over 500,000 being foreign-born.
Polish diaspora
The second-largest Polonia in the world and the largest in Europe is the Polish minority in Germany. Estimates of the number of Poles living in Germany vary from 2 million to about 3 million.
The main Polonia organization is "Kongres Polonii Niemieckiej / Polnischer Kongress in Deutschland". Polish surnames are very common in Germany.
History of Poland (1945–1989)
"b1."Andrzej Leder gives the following figures, quoting Andrzej Paczkowski and Henryk Słabek. Of the 4.7 million people who populated the Recovered Territories in 1945–1950, 2.9 million came from central and south-eastern provinces of the new Polish territory and over 1.5 million from what had become the Soviet Union; smaller numbers of settlers arrived from France, Germany and other countries. From February 1946 to the end of 1948, 2.2 million Germans had to leave Poland (Paczkowski). 2.8 million Poles returned to Poland after the war from Germany and other parts of Western Europe (out of the total of 3.0–3.5 million war displaced who were present there) and many of them settled in the Recovered Territories.(Słabek).
Belarusian minority in Poland
The Belarusian minority in Poland is composed of 47,000 people according to the Polish census of 2011. This number decreased in the last decades from over 300,000 due to an active process of assimilation. Most of them live in the Podlaskie Voivodeship.
World War II casualties of Poland
An estimated 50,000 to 100,000 ethnic Poles were killed in an ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) beginning in March 1943 and lasting until the end of 1944 in the Nazi occupied Volhynia and Eastern Galicia. The Institute of National Remembrance maintains that 7,500 ethnic Ukrainians were also killed during this interethnic conflict The figure of 5.6 to 5.8 million war dead estimated by the IPN was for only the Jewish and ethnic Polish population. They did not provide figures for the death toll of Polish citizens from the other ethnic minorities.According to the figures published by the Polish government in exile in 1941 there were about 7.0 million Polish citizens from ethnic minorities at the beginning of the war in September 1939, mostly Ukrainians, Belarusians, Polishchuks and Lithuanians living in the eastern regions of Poland annexed by the USSR. The IPN did not estimate the death toll of Polish citizens from these ethnic minorities. The IPN maintains that accurate figures for these losses are not available because of border changes and population transfers, according to their figures 308,000 Polish citizens from the ethnic minorities were deported into the interior of the Soviet Union and were conscripted into the Soviet armed forces. During the German occupation Polish citizens from ethnic minorities were deported to Germany for forced labor.In prewar Poland about 800,000 persons were identified as ethnic Germans. According to the IPN 5,437 ethnic Germans were killed in the 1939 military campaign. The IPN also puts the number of Polish citizens conscripted into the German armed forces at 250,000 of whom 60,000 were killed in action. Tens of thousands of ethnic Germans were killed during the Nazi evacuation from Poland in 1944 and 1945, and as a result of repression NKVD and Red Army or died in post war internment camps. During the war the Nazi occupiers instituted the Volksliste in the Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany to register ethnic Germans in Poland. Many Polish citizens were pressured to sign the Volksliste in order to avoid Nazi reprisals. About 1 million persons were on Volksliste groups 1 and 2 that included Polish citizens of German descent; Volksliste groups 3 and 4 included 1.7 Polish citizens that were subject to future Germanisation. In addition 61,000 . ethnic Germans were living in the General Government. During the war 522,149 ethnic Germans from other nations were settled in Poland by the Third Reich. By 1950 670,000 ethnic Germans from prewar Poland had fled or were expelled and about 40,000 remained in Poland; about 200,000 Polish citizens who were on Volksliste groups 1 and 2 during the war were rehabilitated as Polish citizens.
Ethnic minorities in Poland
INTERREG estimated there are up to 2,000,000 Silesians in Poland. In the Polish census of 2002, however, 173,153 people officially declared Silesian ethnicity, although only about 60,000 declared Silesian as their native language. In the 2011 Polish census, Silesian ethnicity was declared by 809 thousand responders out of 5 million in the region, including 362 thousand who declared it as their only ethnicity, 418 thousand who declared it as their first ethnicity, and 415 thousand who declared it jointly with a Polish ethnicity.
World War II casualties of Poland
Thaddeus Piotrowski is a Polish-American sociologist. He is a Professor of Sociology in the Social Science Division of the University of New Hampshire at Manchester. Piotrowski's assessment in 1998 of Polish war losses is that ""Jewish wartime losses in Poland are estimated to be in the 2.7-2.9 million range. (Many Polish Jews found refuge in the Soviet Union and other countries.) Ethnic Polish losses are currently estimated in the range of 2 million. (The number is probably higher if we add all those who died at the hands of the Ukrainian Nationalists.)""
List of Polish Jews
At the start of the Second World War, Poland had the largest Jewish population in the world (over 3.3 million, some 10% of the general Polish population). The vast majority were killed in the Holocaust during the German occupation of Poland, under the Nazi "Final Solution" mass-extermination program. Only 369,000 (11%) of Poland's Jews survived the War.
Ukrainians in Poland
In January 2016 the Embassy of Ukraine in Warsaw informed that the number of Ukrainian residents in Poland was half a million, and probably around one million in total. Ukrainian Ambassador to Poland, Andrii Deshchytsia, noted that Ukrainian professionals enjoy good reputation in Poland and in spite of their growing numbers Polish-Ukrainian relations remain very good.
Soviet invasion of Poland
Of the 13.5 million civilians living in the newly annexed territories, according to the last official Polish census the population was over 38% Poles (5.1 million), 37% Ukrainians (4.7 million), 14.5% Belarusians, 8.4% Jews, 0.9% Russians and 0.6% Germans.
Irredentism
In January, February and March 2012, the Centre for Public Opinion Research conducted a survey, asking Poles about their ties to the Kresy. It turned out that almost 15% of the population of Poland (4.3–4.6 million people) declared that they had either been born in the Kresy, or had a parent or a grandparent who came from that region. Numerous treasures of Polish culture remain and there are numerous Kresy-oriented organizations. There are Polish sports clubs (Pogoń Lwów, FK Polonia Vilnius), newspapers (Gazeta Lwowska, Kurier Wileński), radio stations (in Lviv and Vilnius), numerous theatres, schools, choirs and folk ensembles. Poles living in "Kresy" are helped by Fundacja Pomoc Polakom na Wschodzie, a Polish government-sponsored organization, as well as other organizations, such as The "Association of Help of Poles in the East Kresy" (see also Karta Polaka). Money is frequently collected to help those Poles who live in the "Kresy", and there are several annual events, such as a "Christmas Package for a Polish Veteran in Kresy", and "Summer with Poland", sponsored by the Association "Polish Community", in which Polish children from "Kresy" are invited to visit Poland. Polish language handbooks and films, as well as medicines and clothes are collected and sent to "Kresy". Books are most often sent to Polish schools which exist there — for example, in December 2010, The University of Wrocław organized an event called "Become a Polish Santa Claus and Give a Book to a Polish Child in Kresy". Polish churches and cemeteries (such as Cemetery of the Defenders of Lwów) are renovated with money from Poland.
Migrations from Poland since EU accession
According to a 2013 survey, approximately 14% percent of adult Poles have worked abroad since 2004 (approximately a quarter for over a year); 69% have a family member of a close friend who lives abroad, and approximately 24% are open to immigration. Majority of Polish migrants or those considering leaving are young; according to a 2014 survey approximately 90% of Poles under 34 have considered some form of migration. Over the past decade or so, there has been a visible trend that migrants are increasingly likely to be young and well-educated.
Professor Krystyna Iglicka has estimated that up to half a million Poles emigrated in 2013. 
As of 2011, approximately 80% of Polish emigrants settle in the countries of the European Union. As of 2013, the largest group of modern Polonia can be found in the United Kingdom (550,000), followed by that in Germany (425,608)., in France (350,000 as of 2012), Significant Polish presence can also be found in Ireland (115, 000 as of 2013), in Italy (94,000 as of 2011), in the Netherlands (103,000 as of 2013), and. As of 2011, the largest groups of recent Polish emigrants Poles outside EU were those in the United States (243,000) and in Canada (52,000). The number of Poles in Norway, itself not an EU member, has significantly increased recently (from 43,000 in 2011 to 71,000 as of 2013).