PING!
Posted on 11/20/2006 7:07:08 AM PST by GMMAC
A generation gone south
National Post
Monday, November 20, 2006
Byline: Lorne Gunter
Remember the brain drain? In the late 1990s and early part of this decade, it was a hot topic for commentators and opposition politicians. Tens of thousands of skilled Canadians were leaving each year for the United States.
According to all of the fables Canadians have been fed since the Trudeau era, it shouldn't have been happening. The U.S. was dark territory, Canada the peaceable kingdom. America was rife with racism, poverty, crime, gun violence and homelessness. If you got sick there, and were uninsured, you could bleed to death on the steps of a hospital.
Why would any Canadian move there when he could have multiculturalism, the welfare state, firearms registration and socialized health care?
Brain drain? Ha! Prime minister Jean Chretien labelled it "a myth," even as he was being given internal government reports showing that it was very real and growing dangerously quickly.
The Prime Minister's Advisory Council on Science and Technology warned Mr. Chretien in late 1999 that the drain of doctors (particularly specialists), scientists, professors, computer programmers, executives, economists, nurses and others was a "significant problem," to which Mr. Chretien shrugged: "Everybody has his own statistics on that."
The federal Industry department insisted it wasn't a brain drain, but rather a "brain loan." The sharp minds would almost all eventually come back, the department's analysts reassured.
Except they didn't.
On Friday, Statistics Canada released a study International mobility: Patterns of exit and return of Canadians, 1982 to 2003. It shows that while the talent exodus has slowed since 2001, a low percentage of those who left during the 1990s have returned, or are ever likely to.
The number of "leavers" in 2003, the last year of the study, was roughly what it was in 1982, the first year -- about 15,000 -- which might tend to indicate that that total is a sort of natural floor. Annually, that many Canadians will move away, mostly to the U.S., no matter what the conditions here are.
At the height of the drain, though, in 2000, the number was almost twice that.
While StatsCan points out that "the absolute number of people who leave the country remains small" (even at the peak, only about 133 of every 100,000 Canadians were heading south), it is who is leaving that is the problem.
Research released by the C.D. Howe Institute in 1998 showed better than any other the damage even this numerically small emigration was doing.
For instance, in the first eight years of the 1990s, Canada lost almost 2,000 doctors. Each year, up to 15% of Canadian medical schools' graduating classes were picking up and leaving, even before they had practiced a day of medicine here.
Thankfully, the doctor drain has slowed in recent years (though not entirely disappeared). But when we read about how difficult it is to find a family doctor in many large cities and rural locations, it is not hard to figure out why. Ditto with waiting lists for specialized procedures, such as surgeries. Specialists were even more prone to leave than were general practitioners.
From 1990 to 1998, Canada also lost 2,200 engineers, 500 or more research scientists, 1,200 school teachers, 1,000 university professors and over 3,000 nurses.
For most, the lure was markedly higher take-home pay. But for many in the health professions, it was also the ability to practice cutting-edge medicine that our socialized system would not pay for, and to make medical decisions that were not blocked by political policies.
In the end, no more than about one in five of the leavers will ever come home. StatsCan's report this week shows that five years after leaving, only about 15% ever return. And the number who come back after five years is insignificant.
So much for the "brain loan" theory.
Nor are incoming immigrants making up for the lost skills, innovation, investment or economic activity caused by the drain. The idea -- often referred to by social scientists as "churning" -- that inbound foreign-born professionals and entrepreneurs will make up for their outbound Canadian-born counterparts is a mirage.
Just as a generation of aerospace engineers and early computer specialists were lost forever to the U.S. in the 1950s -- and with them the industries that they helped to found -- another generation slipped southward in the 1990s, thanks largely to short-sighted government.
PING!
A good summary of socialism vs capitalism...
Only the real smart kanucks come to the USA, that is goodness.
Pelosi and Reid will try and reverse this problem.
John Roberts was the best disc jockey Canada ever had.
At our Syangogue in Fargo, ND, most of the doctors are refugees from Canadian socialized medicine.
Jennifer Granholm, Governor of Michigan
"Jennifer Granholm, Governor of Michigan"
First, I'll stack up her academic -- and professional -- credentials against YOURS any day of the week. You might not agree with her, but (like Dubya) the vast majority of us can't argue against their academic and professional credentials.
Second, she left when she was FIVE YEARS OLD. FIVE. It's not like she had a choice here. By this standard, I'm an Indianapolis resident, even though I haven't lived there since my father was transferred out of there in 1971.
If you're gonna make political commentary, then do it. If you're gonna take cheap shots, then at least make them funny.
Talk about a truthful statement. Pelosi and Reid drive any sane person "insane." Our American heroes in Arlington, who gave the last measure of devotion to this country, are turning in their graves at the thought of these anti-American, anti-military cowards in power.
As you probably know, most Canadian industry arises from branch plant economics from U.S. and other foreign companies. Under branch plant economics, there is no need to have R&D and as much on-site enginnering in Canada when the home office in the U.S. takes care of those functions. It's only a few hours drive to most industrial centers in Canada from the U.S.
Also, roughly half the population (54-56% I think)in Canada has a bachelor's degree compared with about a quarter (about 24% I think) in the U.S. So, in Canada, there are more people looking for proprtionately fewer jobs requiring degrees. Hence, more employment opportunity for Canadian professionals with degrees is in the U.S. For example, when I got my PhD, I sent out about 100 resumes. 12 were returned, unopenned, from HR departments labelled "Refused by Addressee" and I had no interviews. Sent my first 5 resumes in the U.S., and had three interviews with two job offers. And the jobs were better than any in Canada I saw and were in my field of study, too!
These reasons, in addition to what's in this article, are strong motivating factors for relocation to the U.S.
Also, I was one of the people actually contacted by Stats Canada after I moved here. The article is spot on accurate.
His betters know to stick with spinning 45s. Somehow, Roberts passed muster as a CBS (now CNN) newsman.
That is a very good point. Reflecting upon my graduate school experiences shortly after entering the real world, I really began to view universities as research facilities dependent upon cheap, student labour and without much compassion for what happens to these students after they get their cap and gown. The bigger the research group, the more papers a professor can publish and that drives his research funding. This translates into department culture where it's the ability to publish that drives recruitment of new professors. The sad part is that many students are not aware of how competitive the real world is and what the challeneges are in finding a fulfilling career.
Being so blinded by ideology generally prevents one from engaging in reasonable discussion on matters of public policy that are open to rational differences of opinion of ways, means and ends.
Where's the SARCASM warning?..LOL...
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