Brain Drain and Reverse Brain Drain

Since talent is everything in the high tech industries, any countries with the high tech base have been concerned about averting brain drain and augmenting reverse brain drain. The question is: why some countries have been successful with the reverse brain drain policy and practices and why some countries experience a brain drain to other countries?

In order to come up with new growth engines or replace the imported goods with locally-produced goods (Korea still has high trade deficit in electronic parts and components), Korea (any other country for that matter) needs top notch talents. The reverse brain drain of R&D manpower from abroad led by the government first and followed by the private sector in the 1980s was an effective tool to absorb advanced technological knowhow. The reverse drain policy and practices in Korea was successful and still continues to some extent, but many of them have left due to various reasons.

As I recently pointed out, China sees the increased reverse brain drain since opportunities are there for the qualified engineers, although we don’t know how long this trend would last.

In order to ward off brain drain and reverse the brain drain, several factors should be taken into account. The overall economic fundamentals, excellent engineering schools and social infrastructure (e.g., stable political system and solid educational system for their kids) are among them.

It is ironic that even though the Korean put so much emphasis on education in general, Korea still lags behind the West in terms of the level of engineering education.

Why do the top U.S. high tech firms not hire foreign Ph.D.s from emerging countries? Why do foreign students who got their Ph.D.s at the top engineering schools in the U.S. still prefer to stay with the American high tech firms in most cases, while this may soon change? Why is there the lack of interest of U.S. students in pursuing Ph.D. in engineering?

Again, innovation apparatus doesn’t exist in isolation.