The DOI matches its Crossref record; 29 of the 29 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Eight Questions about Brain Drain
Open accessAbstract
The term “brain drain” dominates popular discourse on high-skilled migration, and for this reason, we use it in this article. However, as Harry Johnson noted, it is a loaded phrase implying serious loss. It is far from clear that such a loss actually occurs in practice; indeed, there is an increasing recognition of the possible benefits that skilled migration can offer both for migrants and for sending countries. This paper builds upon a recent wave of empirical research to answer eight key questions underlying much of the brain drain debate: 1) What is brain drain? 2) Why should economists care about it? 3) Is brain drain increasing? 4) Is there a positive relationship between skilled and unskilled migration? 5) What makes brain drain more likely? 6) Does brain gain exist? 7) Do high-skilled workers remit, invest, and share knowledge back home? 8) What do we know about the fiscal and production externalities of brain drain?
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Cites
(2012) · American Economic Review · doi:10.1257/aer.102.2.i · Cited by 13,709
Self-Selection and the Earnings of Immigrants
BORJAS, G. J. (2021) · World Scientific Studies in International Economics · doi:10.1142/9789811240812_0004 · Cited by 2,659
The New Argonauts. Regional Advantage in a Global Economy
Frenken, K. (2009) · Regional Studies · doi:10.1080/00343400903132601 · Cited by 1,392
Globalization, Brain Drain, and Development
Docquier, F., & Rapoport, H. (2012) · Journal of Economic Literature · doi:10.1257/jel.50.3.681 · Cited by 1,083
Income maximization and the selection and sorting of international migrants
Grogger, J., & Hanson, G. H. (2011) · Journal of Development Economics · doi:10.1016/j.jdeveco.2010.06.003 · Cited by 883
Human Development Report 2009. Overcoming Barriers: Human Mobility and DevelopmentPreprint
Klugman, J. (2009) · SSRN Electronic Journal · Cited by 804
Self-Selection Patterns in Mexico-U.S. Migration: The Role of Migration Networks
McKenzie, D., & Rapoport, H. (2010) · Review of Economics and Statistics · doi:10.1162/rest_a_00032 · Cited by 616
Self-citation(2006) · Digital Access to Libraries (Université catholique de Louvain (UCL), l'Université de Namur (UNamur) and the Université Saint-Louis (USL-B)) · Cited by 571
Can migration reduce educational attainment? Evidence from Mexico
McKenzie, D., & Rapoport, H. (2011) · Journal of Population Economics · doi:10.1007/s00148-010-0316-x · Cited by 558
Self-citationDemocracy and Foreign Education
Spilimbergo, A. (2009) · American Economic Review · doi:10.1257/aer.99.1.528 · Cited by 503
Cited by
Ruel, M. T., & Alderman, H. (2013) · The Lancet · doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(13)60843-0 · Cited by 1,820
Globalization, Brain Drain, and Development
Docquier, F., & Rapoport, H. (2012) · Journal of Economic Literature · doi:10.1257/jel.50.3.681 · Cited by 1,083
Why has regional income convergence in the U.S. declined?
Ganong, P., & Shoag, D. (2017) · Journal of Urban Economics · doi:10.1016/j.jue.2017.07.002 · Cited by 474
Diasporas and Outsourcing: Evidence from oDesk and India
Ghani, E., Kerr, W. R., & Stanton, C. (2014) · Management Science · doi:10.1287/mnsc.2013.1832 · Cited by 118
Brain Drain and Productivity Growth: Evidence From South Africa, 1947–2019
Fedderke, J., & Dong, X. (2026) · Economics of Transition and Institutional Change · doi:10.1111/ecot.70031
Metadata
- Authors
- Gibson, J., & McKenzie, D.
- Venue
- Journal of Economic Perspectives
- Publisher
- American Economic Association
- Published
- 2011-08-01
- Volume
- 25
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 107-128
- ISSN
- 0895-3309 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2122217905
- Cited by
- 305
- References
- 29
- FWCI
- 78.23
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
