America’s Loss is the World’s Gain

Over the history of the United States, immigrants have contributed greatly to this country’s success. The latest wave has been highly skilled Indians and Chinese – engineers, scientists and doctors – who came here to study or to work. In the past, these immigrant groups would become established, then they’d buy homes, start companies, create jobs and stimulate OUR economy. But lately, many have realized that they don’t need to stay in America to enjoy the American Dream. In fact, they can go back home and acept lower relative salaries and still afford mansions and servants. In 2008, researcher Vivek Wadhwa led a group that surveyed 12-hundred Indian and Chinese immigrants who had worked in the US for a year or more, or had received their education here, only to return to their home countries. Three quarters of the sample had a master’s degree or a PhD – and most of those were earned in fields related to science and technology. They were young, in their early 30s, the vast majority was male – and they were taking what they had learned and their disposable incomes back to India and China. This sounds good for the American economy in the short run (if they leave, there will be more job openings for American citizens), but Wadhwa argues that if these skilled workers felt welcomed and stayed here, they would launch companies and create far more jobs than they leave by heading home or by never coming to the US in the first place. Click here for the link to download the study. (click download, then select “SSRN” to save or open the PDF file)

-Chad