Britain's Brain Drain
The Spectator's CoffeeHouse has picked up on an OECD report which sheds further illumination on yesterday's observations about immigration:
We’re so focussed on the 1,500 arriving here every day that no one really focuses on the 1,000 leaving every day. Figures from the OECD show more graduates, 1.3million, have fled Britain than any other developed country (even America, which has five times our population). On Brits deemed to have “high skills,” 15% have left to live abroad – the highest ratio in the developed world save for the notoriously itinerant Irish and Kiwis.One could hope that this might be because we have a lot of people committed to providing humanitarian assistance in the developing world, but I suspect not. In fairness though, what Fraser Nelson doesn't note is that we also have one of the highest percentages of highly qualified immigrants and, indeed, have a net inflow of 108,507 highly qualified migrants, as the following chart from page 13 of the OECD report shows:
3 comments:
No surprises there, how can anyone young hope to buy a house and establish themselves in this country?
The reason people are thinking of leaving is twofold. A) if you earn £40,000 a year then the government takes more of your salary than you do - and then charges you to use the services it sets up! and B) Civil liberties are steadily being eroded by the DVLC, the police and the criminal law system. That's why I'm thinking of leaving!!
The world does not change! The 'Brain Drain' just appears to get worse because of our increasing population figures.
In the 1960's many of my colleagues were seeking and taking employment in the United States and elsewhere gaining salaries which were higher and living conditions better for the children they were having.
If only I had joined them instead of staying in a 'safe' Government post! For the last five years of my employment I had no increase in salary thus making my retirement pension (based on earnings) effectively decrease in size.
Now I am penalised for having that pension and pay ever more of it to the Government. I cannot get the medical treatment I need without a very long wait and when I get to the stage of needing to be cared for by others I will have to sell my property to pay for myself.
Perhaps I should attend evening classes - not to better myself - but to learn the same language used by the traders and workmen who efficiently carry out jobs on my house and garden, and enable myself to converse with them.
I do not blame the young and qualified for leaving the country. They probably feel they are being pushed out by a Government that no longer cares for the man-in-the-street who is trying to help himself.
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