The Global Migration of Skill

01 June 2009

Professor Mark R. Rosenzweig

 This lecture examined the growing phenomenon of international skilled migration with particular attention to its impact on developing countries. A framework was developed for understanding the different measures of ‘brain drain' and how they are related to wage and income differences across countries around the world. Based on new data sources, differences in the prices of skill across countries were estimated and were used to explore how skill price differentials affect the magnitudes and skill-intensity of permanent migration to the United States and Australia and the magnitudes and direction of the flows of foreign students. Particular attention was also paid to the circular flow of migration and to understanding the role of higher education in fostering the outflow of international students and their return to their home countries.

Broad Topics: Arts and Social Sciences, Asia and the Pacific, Business and Economics

Sub-topics: Economics

Areas: ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, ANU College of Business and Economics

Mark R. Rosenzweig is the Frank Altschul Professor of International Economics and Director of the Economic Growth Center at Yale University. He has served as the Director of the Center for International Development at Harvard University. He studies the causes and consequences of economic development as well as international migration. Rosenzweig is one of the principal investigators of the New Immigrant Survey, the first national longitudinal survey of immigrants in the United States, and was Director of research for the U.S. Select Commission on Refugee and Immigration Policy. Rosenzweig was Co-Editor of the Handbook of Family and Population Economics and with Dani Rodrik is editing the newest Handbook of Development Economics. Rosenzweig also serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Development Economics. He is a Fellow of the Econometric Society and the Society of Labor Economists. Rosenzweig earned BA, MA and PhD degrees from Columbia University.

This lecture was held as part of the ANU Trevor Swan Distinguished Lectures in Economics