In the 1960s and 1970s, the flow of scientists, engineers and medical personnel from developing to industrialised nations was thought to have almost entirely negative consequences for the source countries.
Recently, there has been growing emphasis on reverse flows of knowledge, skills and money the migrants send home. What was once termed brain drain is now seen as brain circulation, but this has blurred important issues.
The evidence of reverse benefits flowing back to source nations is far from convincing.
While the value of money sent home by all migrants can be large, there are grounds for believing that the amounts sent by highly skilled migrants are fairly modest.
Another issue is the “diaspora effect”, whereby emigrants’ networks and knowledge can generate important benefits in their home countries. Countries can benefit when emigrants return home with accumulated skills and experience.
There are no balance sheets on net flows of skilled scientific personnel, but trends indicate that most brain “circulation” is highly asymmetric. Reverse flows seem to be far smaller than initial outward flows.
Meanwhile, the argument that the possibility of emigration will increase incentives for developing countries to invest in their human capital does not hold true.
It is the taxpayers of poor countries who make the investments in human capital that give rise to the migration-derived benefits in rich countries.
Many of the recent policy discussions have only nibbled at the basic issues.
Perhaps it is time to reconsider Indian economist Jagdish Bhagwati’s proposal: levy a low tax — say 5% of salary costs — on companies in rich countries that employ highly skilled immigrants, and use the proceeds to create a global fund for developing human capital in poor countries. From the United States alone, this could yield as much as US$2,5-billion a year.
Among the key reasons that highly skilled migrants are often reluctant to go home is that they fear losing the cultural, scientific or entrepreneurial environment necessary to maintain their skills base.
Most foreign graduate students from developing countries fear that after their return they will be cut off from knowledge because of administrative hassles and restrictions on visa applications.
This could be solved if recipient nations issued permanent visas to skilled workers. In The Netherlands, for example, the director of the University of Maastricht has proposed awarding foreign graduates a permanent visa, allowing a voluntary “recirculation” that both their country of origin and country of training could support.
Such facilitation will be one of the new tasks for immigration policy in the 21st century and could be a useful way to tackle the brain drain. — Â