1. School of Medical Education
Brain Drain
Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences
School of Medical Education
Strategic Policy Sessions: 12

2. For every complex problem, there’s a simple, obvious answer
that just happens to be wrong!
H.L. Menken

3. Between 150,000-180,000 Iranians try to immigrate by various means annually

4. The latest figures released by the International Monetary Found (IMF) indicates that Iran ranks first in brain drain among 61 developing and less developed countries (LDC).

5. Our part in others development !
1.434 million people (12%) out of the 12 million people who have science and engineering degrees in the U.S.A., are of foreign origin.
Over 72% of these were originally born in a developing country.
23% of those having a doctorate are not U.S.A. born citizens
This proportion in key areas such as engineering and computer sciences is 40%
The SESTAT database of the National Science Foundation (NSF) 2005

6. Effect on mother land
For large countries like India and China, which dominate in terms of absolute numbers, skilled migration does not amount to a significant share of their educated workforces.
Indeed, only 1.1 and 1.4 percent of India and China’s skilled labour forces respectively had moved to the USA in 1990, although additional evidence – suggests that these migrants come from the top end of the skill distribution.
In Ghana, for example, over a quarter of the educated labour force lived in OECD countries in 1990, the share rises to over 60 percent for the Gambia and approaches 80 percent for Jamaica.

7. Population, millions Migration rate China 1238 1.4 1943 India 979 1.1
Total expenditure on
tertiary education,
per student $
China
1238
1.4
1943
India
979
1.1
2014
Pakistan
131
2.4
448
Mexico 95
10.3
3459
Turkey 63
3365
Iran 62
14.7
398
Malaysia 22
4.4
4901

8. Islamic Republic of Iran

9. Who are the expatriates?
Of 125 Iranian high school students who have won awards at International Science Olympiads over the past three years, 90 of them are now at US universities (2001 figures)
More than 150,000 Iranian surgeons and engineers now live in the United States

10. Demographical profile of the Iranian immigrant community in the United States
84% speak fluent English.
46% have a bachelors degree or higher
43% are in professional and managerial positions
35% in technical and administrative
48% are dual income earners
22% own their own businesses.
Median family income is $55,501 (substantially above the national average of $35,492) and per capita income is $18,040.
92% have a mortgage.

13. Brain Flow   
Expatriate Group
Susceptible Group
Stable Group

14. Brain Flow
Internal Factors   

15. Migration of educated people is not the ‘disease’
Disease vs. Symptom
Migration of educated people is not the ‘disease’
It is the
‘symptom’

16. Comparative Study
UNESCO:

17. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
Self-
actualization
Needs
Esteem Needs
Love, Affection and
Belongingness Needs
Safety Needs
Physiological Needs.

18. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
50 meters of housing costs between 12,500,000
to more than 75,000,000 Toomans
Marriage rate decreases and mean age of
marriage increases significantly mainly
due to financial problem
Physiological Needs.
Safety Needs
Love, Affection and
Belongingness Needs
Esteem Needs
Self-
actualization
Needs
There is intense demand for university places.
The entrance exams are very competitive and
Less than 15% of the approximately 1.5 million
people who take the exams annually, actually
begin studies.
Unemployment, officially at 13 percent, is closer
to 20 percent, according to independent
economists.
each year 270,000 university graduates enter
the job market, whereas only 75,000 can be
absorbed.
Some 4,000 physicians, 14,000 midwives,
and 17,000 nurses are unemployed, and
hospitals are laying off personnel while
5,000 medical students graduate every year.

19. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
Perhaps more important, underemployment
is the norm.
Physiological Needs.
Safety Needs
Love, Affection and
Belongingness Needs
Esteem Needs
Self-
actualization
Needs
The average engineer makes $150 to $250 a
month, slightly less than the monthly income
of a taxi driver and 10 times less than what he
might have made some 20 years ago.
Independent economists estimate that Iran needs
to create close to 1 million jobs a year to keep
up with its youthful population.
In order for Iran to meet its high demand for
jobs, up to $10 billion a year of productive
investment will be required,"
100, ,000 job per $1,000,000,000
Over 70 percent of the industrial companies is
state-owned and small industries make up
92.6 percent of the total industrial sector
Only 1.4 percent of employment creators
posses the necessary credentials to manage
an industrial unit.

20. Important variables for brain drain in Iran

21. Brain Flow
External Factors   

22. The United States 22% of the worlds R&D workforce,
40% of the worlds GERD (Gross Expenditure in R&D) and mainstream science production
30-50% of the patents of technological innovation, in the world
O.S.T p341, UNESCO 1998, pp23-25

23. Intellectual Dilution
Generational
Transmission of
Intellectual
Capacity
More
Reproduction at
Lower IQ Range
More Brain Drain
at upper IQ range
Iso-intellectual
Marriage
Skewness
to Right
Normal
Distribution of IQ
Intellectual Dilution IQ
Intellectual Pool (%)
Group IQ
Prevalence
Mildly (or Basically) Gifted
1:6 - 1:40
Moderately Gifted
1:40 - 1:1000
Highly Gifted
1: :10,000
Exceptionally Gifted
1:10, :1 million
Profoundly Gifted
180+
Fewer than 1:1 million IQ
Intellectual Capacity
Frequency IQ
Brain Drain
Reproduction

24. Effect on unskilled employment
There is an optimal balance between the number of
skilled labor workforce
unskilled labor workforce
Brain Drain also leads to unskilled unemployment

25. Brain Flow   

26. “Block” Option    Failed to Bring Feasible or Effective
Solutions (Meyer et al. 1997).
Main Policy before 1980s was to
Prevent or Regulate Brain Drain

27. “Compensate” Option    $ Compensate for:
Cancel the Negative Effects of Brain Drain through Taxation.
Compensate for:
Higher Education Costs
Elementary and Middle Education Costs
Social Subsides $

28. “Compensate” Option
Theoretical Assumptions on which these Policies were Based are Wrong
They basically referred to human capital approaches where the skilled person is conceived as an individual capital asset, made of all his/her qualifications and professional experience resulting of prior investments (Gary Becker).
The human capital approach reflects but a small part of the phenomenon.

29. “Return” Option    The “More” Option: Unchanged Susceptible Pool
More Money
More Respect
More Opportunity
Unchanged Susceptible Pool

30. “Return” Option
The Republic of Korea has focused on encouraging skilled emigrants to return, rather than invest at home.
Intensive recruiting programs search out older professionals and scholars and offer them salaries competitive with overseas incomes, better working conditions, and help with housing and children’s schooling.

31. “Return” Option
Visiting professor programs allow the Republic of Korea to tap the expertise of those uncertain about returning home for good.
These initiatives, backed by the country’s improved economy, have produced strong results.
In the 1960’s, just 16 percent of Korean scientists and engineers with doctorates from the United States returned to Korea. In the 1980’s, that share jumped to about 70 percent.

33. “Scientific Diaspora” Option  
Brain Gain Concept
the expatriate skilled population
may be considered as a potential asset

34. The Scientific Diaspora Option
It takes for granted that many of the expatriates are not likely to return. They have often settled abroad and built their professional as well as their personal life there.
However, they may still be very concerned with the development of their country of origin, because of religious, cultural, family or other ties.
The objective, then, is to create the links through which they could effectively and productively be connected to its development, without any physical temporary or permanent return.

35. The Scientific Diaspora Option
This type of distant cooperative work is now possible as cases of international research projects or multinational corporations’ (MNC).
Relationships between expatriate intellectuals and their mother country have often existed in the past.
What is new today, is that these sporadic, exceptional and limited links may now become systematic, dense and multiple.

36. The Scientific Diaspora Option
Student/Scholarly Networks,
Local Associations of Skilled Expatriates,
Expert pool assistance through the Transfer of Knowledge Through Expatriate Nationals (TOKTEN) program of the UNDP
Intellectual/Scientific Diaspora Networks.
Developing
Established and organized

37. Networked Activities Conferences Seminars Workshops
Focus group discussions
Social events such as dinners, new year
Newsletter or news groups
Joint developmental projects

38. “Absorb-Prevent” Option  

39. “Absorb-Prevent” Option  
Investment on:
Education
R&D
Infrastructures
Involve them in:
Sustainable Development Process
Develop a Shared Vision

40. “Absorb-Prevent” Option
This option has been successfully realized in various new industrialized countries (NICs) such as Singapore and the Republic of Korea or big developing countries such as India and China (Charum, Meyer, 1999).
Strong programs to repatriate many of their skilled nationals abroad have been put in place since 1980.
They have created at home the networks in which these returnees could effectively find a place and be operational.

41. “Absorb-Prevent” Option
These countries are the ones that significantly invest in S&T material as well as human infrastructure.
They had started to build the research and technico-industrial web which could appropriately sustain such R&D activities employing S&E.
Obviously the success of that option depends very much on this specific capacity. Such a prerequisite is not easily matched by many developing countries.

42. Thank You !
Any Question ?