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This article provides information about the dominance of rich countries over employment accessibility:
In the contemporary phase of rapid globalisation and revolutionary changes in the technological developments there is a widening gap in terms of country’s participation in global economy and the benefits that these countries, enterprises and individuals reap from this participation. Also within many countries the gap in terms of access to decent work and incomes and participation in economic and social life is widening between various income groups.
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The poorly educated and trained are generally the losers in the process of economic change where society as a whole seems to march towards higher order of development. This is what happens in knowledge societies. Those who have access to knowledge and related technologies can take advantage of emerging economy and thus the economic advantage. This true in the case of both the individuals and nations.
Globalisation, declining communication and transportation costs, and the opening of political borders combine to facilitate increased movements of skilled people. This dynamic is de facto leading to a global market for advanced human capital in which individuals with higher education are the most likely to participate. This may lead to mobilisation of qualified people from lesser developed to the developed countries, thereby depriving the developing countries the service of their better minds. In this 21st century marketplace, the richer countries strive to attract and retain the world’s best-trained minds in many ways.
Among the more powerful “pull” factors are effective policies that stimulate R&D activities and increase direct investment, offer attractive post-graduate training and research opportunities, and recruit younger graduates and professionals. OECD countries are increasing their investments in R&D not only in the science and technology sector but also in other knowledge-based sectors, thus creating job opportunities for well-trained people.
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For example, in early 2001 the Australian government announced a 100 per cent increase in the funding of the Australian Research Council and a tax write-off equivalent to 175 per cent of the value of R&D spending by firms. Roughly 25 per cent of the science and engineering students in U.S. graduate schools come from other countries. This amounts to somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 students from abroad who are introduced into the U.S. market for advanced human capital. Most of these students received their basic education and first degrees in their home countries — meaning that the cost of their initial training was probably assumed by the countries of origin rather than by the country of employment.
Advanced countries are opening recruitment offices in countries where, because of lack of opportunity and political instability, graduates are available. Australia, Canada, EU members, and others all compete for their share of well-trained people in the global marketplace. France and Germany have freed up the issuance of visas to attract foreign professionals in technology-related areas, and in October 2000 the United States introduced an amendment to its immigration laws that made available 600,000 new visas for scientists and engineers.
The global labour market for advanced human capital is an expanding reality that brings the circulation of skills and the related problem of “brain drain” to the forefront of national concern, particularly in developing countries. Whether it results from push or pull factors, brain drain can have a debilitating effect on national governing structures, management capacities, productive sectors, and tertiary institutions. It is estimated, for example, that at least 40 per cent of the graduates of the highly regarded Indian Institutes of Technology seek employment abroad.
The countries of Sub-Saharan Africa have an average tertiary enrolment rate of only 4 per cent, compared with 81 per cent in the United States, yet it is estimated that about 30,000 Africans holding Ph.Ds live outside Africa and that 130,000 Africans are currently studying overseas. Although the phenomenon of brain drain – international mobility of skilled human resources – existed in the past too, this received an increased acceleration in the contemporary phase of technological development when knowledge and knowledge workers become commodities of high value.
The rising process of brain drain can have positive as well as negative effects on countries at all levels of development. Developing countries, however, tend to suffer largely adverse consequences, as they may lose the very technical and professional specialists who would be capable of contributing to poverty- alleviating improvements in the living conditions of the local population.