
Brain Drain Across the United States - js2
https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/republicans/2019/4/losing-our-minds-brain-drain-across-the-united-states
======
taurath
Brain drain within the US is just as frequently about cultural rather than
economic issues. The culture wars the republicans have been running on since
the 80s turns off thoughtful people - anti-intellectualism is killing these
states.

That said, it’s incredibly underserved and there’s tons of very capable and
friendly people.

Edit: maybe I didn’t get the intended point across - I’d ask though, how many
people do you know that moved for cultural reasons, especially from hometowns?
I’m in the LGBT community where almost every single person I meet has moved
for cultural reasons.

~~~
burlesona
I'm not sure the map backs up what you're saying.

If you look at the 2017 Net Brain Drain it shows the following top gainers: \-
Texas \- Virginia \- Illinois \- Maryland \- Colorado \- California \- New
Jersey \- New York \- Massachussets

Georgia and North Carolina also showed strong gains (along with many other
states). That may be blue-leaning but it's not a landslide.

It's more like people are concentrating in the biggest cities generally, and
to the degree that there's a blue-shift its that states dominated by their
urban population lean democrat and states dominated by a rural population lean
republican, so the cultural change follows the demographic shifts rather than
driving them.

~~~
jaredklewis
How is it not a landslide? Of the 9 top gainers you listed, only one leans
republican (Texas) [1]. All others lean democratic.

Of course as pointed out by a sibling, it’s kind of an irrelevant point
anyway. The brain migration is away from rural areas (which are red,
regardless of state), to big cities (which are blue, regardless of state).
That only reenforces the parent’s hypothesis that intellectuals resent the
anti-intellectual bent republicans have taken in recent times.

1\. [https://news.gallup.com/poll/247025/democratic-states-
exceed...](https://news.gallup.com/poll/247025/democratic-states-exceed-
republican-states-four-2018.aspx)

~~~
Izkata
Illinois at least supports their claim - that it's because of the large
cities, not the states as a whole. Take away Chicago and Illinois would be
pretty Republican:
[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Il...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/51/Illinois_Governor_Election_Results_by_County%2C_2018.svg/150px-
Illinois_Governor_Election_Results_by_County%2C_2018.svg.png)

------
defen
Now, consider the "meta-brain-drain" of 1) increased assortative mating
(people are increasingly more likely to marry someone of similar educational
and professional achievement) and 2) college-educated women delaying
childbirth and having fewer children than non-college-educated women.

The net result is that more educated people tend to have fewer children than
the less educated. If we assume educational attainment is correlated with
intelligence, and children's intelligence is correlated to parental
intelligence, this doesn't bode well for future generations. It seems like we
as a society need to figure out a way to make "have children at a reasonable
age" not be a low-status move for highly educated / driven / intelligent
women.

[https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/fertility/...](https://www.census.gov/newsroom/releases/archives/fertility/cb11-83.html)

~~~
shmageggy
> _It seems like we as a society need to figure out a way to make "have
> children at a reasonable age" not be a low-status move for highly educated /
> driven / intelligent women._

Isn't the obvious answer better maternity leave laws? Ambitious women in the
US don't have kids because it fucks their career. The US is literally last
among OECD countries, offering zero guaranteed maternity pay [1].

[1] [https://money.cnn.com/2018/01/19/news/economy/countries-
most...](https://money.cnn.com/2018/01/19/news/economy/countries-most-
maternity-leave/index.html)

~~~
phamilton
One big part of this is that even if you have guaranteed maternity pay, it
still hurts your career. In a highly competitive environment, I don't see how
not working for X amount of time doesn't lead to being X amount of time behind
in career growth.

The answer is to have less competitive environments. In Sweden, jantelagen (a
cultural sentiment that discourages overt personal ambition) is a huge part of
what enables generous leave policies.

~~~
solatic
You can't really tell American business culture to be less competitive. You
might as well try to get Klingons to be less war-happy. If you're going to try
to improve the situation for women, you have to work within the system as it
exists.

The best hope is improving remote work and improving transportation
infrastructure. Women don't have to leave jobs that they can do from home, and
client visits are less impactful when they take less time to visit the client
and return. It's not a solution which fits nicely into a single bill of
legislation to be passed, but it's the groundwork that the US needs to make it
happen.

~~~
blub
Taking care of a kid is a full time job during the first years. Many partly
outsource it after year 1. :)

------
crazygringo
Interesting... I've only ever heard of brain drain used in an international
context. Which is where the US comes out as a winner, as we're gaining from
all the highly educated Chinese and Indians who come here to work and start
companies.

I actually find the concept rather odd to use domestically, because it's
generally used to show a contrast between a country paying for your college
education, and then you reaping the benefits in a different, richer country --
which can seem unfair.

But in the US, students 1) generally pay for their own college education, and
2) often go to college in a state different from where they grew up _and_
different from where they'll settle down later. So it doesn't seem to have any
"unfair" aspect.

I mean, complaining about brain drain domestically feels like complaining
about free trade domestically... it doesn't make sense to me. People have the
freedom to move to areas of better economic opportunity and that's a good
thing in a dynamic, ever-changing country like America. Complaining about
brain drain domestically really just sounds like wishing more people lived in
the country instead of in big cities... no thanks.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_capital_flight#United_St...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_capital_flight#United_States)

~~~
landryraccoon
The problem is that local governments and communities acting in their own self
interest will rationally underfund education.

Let's say that hypothetically all new science and engineering jobs are all in
ScienceVille. In that case, any local government that doesn't receive some
direct tax benefit from taxes collected in SV has negative incentive to teach
their students anything about Science, since those students will just leave
(after their education has been invested in by the local government) and move
to SV to get a job. Those local government are now incentivized to teach their
kids anything else (like religion and manual labor) since even if they can
only do manual labor at least they're going to stay in their hometown.

Now there is a difference of incentives for the individual States verses the
Nation. The Nation would prefer to have lots more engineers and skilled tech
workers. The States would prefer to keep their best and their brightest, and
if that means they are underutilized that's still a local maximum for the
individual State.

Naturally, this is great for SV, but horrible for the rest of the nation. In
this scenario, the entirely imaginary, hypothetical "SV" has to either give
something back to incentivize the rest of the nation to keep teaching Science
and Engineering, or the rest of the country continually subsidizes SV through
education which is unsustainable.

~~~
cageface
Japan has an interesting approach to this problem. I don’t remember the
details but they have some mechanism to funnel tax revenues from big urban
areas to the smaller cities that provide a lot of their educated workforce.

~~~
C4K3
Hometown tax

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hometown_tax](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hometown_tax)

Its implementation is flawed though, citizens can freely pick any city even if
they have no relation to it, and cities are allowed to give gifts to citizens
who choose the city, resulting in cities competing to offer the best
kickbacks.

------
opportune
I’m from Kentucky, live on the west coast, and I cannot at all sympathize with
those from there and similar states if they complain about brain drain. If you
boast stupid, backwards policies and only give economic opportunities to the
well connected, don’t be surprised when the intelligent but not well connected
people leave the state. Maybe I’ll retire to my backwards hometown but I make
more than double on the west coast than I could (as an employee) there, so not
moving back anytime soon.

~~~
Pokepokalypse
Having moved from a rust-belt blue state; who had liberal policies (but. . .
just failed to nurture their tech industry like other states did), I moved to
California; for a richer employment opportunity.

In terms of skills I could learn on the job, there's no way I could have gone
nearly as far in my career if I limited myself to the set of employers that
were available to me in my hometown.

Now, I've moved to a red state, (for family reasons), and I have interviewed
at about 20 different companies. The "tech industry" is very different from
California. There's a little bit of a software startup industry growing, most
of the jobs are in healthcare and financial IT. Nobody wants to pay people
what they could earn elsewhere. And in terms of career paths there's not a lot
out there that offers much of a future. (or at least it appears that way).
None of these companies seem like they have any kind of vision other than
general business continuity. It's a completely different experience than I had
interviewing with tech companies in California.

Even worse: the company I did take a job at can't seem to retain talent. And
when we look for it, we can't find it. (And when we find it - I implore them
to make it worth the candidate's time. . . and HR simply responds about what
the "market rate" is. - which is why I keep interviewing elsewhere. . . ).

In a nutshell; the main difference seems to be - technology companies in
California are in the business to innovate, and create new technology, and to
become industry leaders. Where, in my new state; they're in the business to
just be in business.

~~~
taurath
It’s the great American business bureaucracy - the middlemen companies that
don’t drive anything forward, they just provide the minimum service to get
their piece of the money funnel.

This exists in the Valley too. IBM, Oracle, Cisco, many businesses once they
reach a certain maturity point just turn into “steady” parts of the market.

------
md224
Whenever I see this topic come up, I think back to the climactic speech in the
movie Good Will Hunting, the one where Chuckie excoriates Will for wanting to
put down roots in the community he grew up in. He concludes:

"It'd be an insult to us if you're still here in 20 years. Hangin' around here
is a fuckin' waste of your time."

This was framed as an inspirational moment that finally pushed Will to achieve
his potential. This idea -- that self-actualization requires abandoning your
small-town roots -- is ingrained in our cultural DNA.

~~~
jonathankoren
An early memory of mine is when my mother told me that there was no future for
me in Southern Illinois, and when I grew up, I’d have to move far away.

She was right. I did, right to the Bay Area. When I go back and visit, the
area has gotten more economically depressed, and frankly more stereotypical.
And to put a cherry on top, I am completely unemployable there.

------
expressrunning
What’s interesting is the world has a brain drain.....and the highly educated
adults are going to US. From places like India and China.

Don’t believe me? Check this out: Chinese students got beaten down by
university securities, for protesting against fake degrees given to them.
Happened today
[https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/bhxgng/chinas_studen...](https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/bhxgng/chinas_student_geting_beats_by_police/)

~~~
badosu
I'd say there's brain drain even if the workers stay at their country, working
remotely for US companies.

The most qualified people around me on previous jobs moved to US, Europe or
are working remotely (myself included).

It's sad because it increases the difficulty of local companies to grow a good
team, continuing the cycle.

------
axaxs
This applies to me, I guess. I've tolerated Kentucky long enough. They keep
increasing taxes to pay for pensions they've looted in the past, while nixing
services. I feel no benefit at all from my taxes that keep going up. Paired
with low wages and a low educated populace, I'm outta here.

------
zdmc
Brain Drain is about networking. Why would most give up the opportunity to
relocate around the top thinkers in their field? Inhibiting this movement
would arguably slow down progress, while making the country more robust (much
like the pros/cons associated with most centralization vs. de-centralization
topics).

People from my hometown (pop. ~7500 in Midwest), do not realize that they are
falling behind at an almost exponential rate. Many are working jobs that
require common training, they do not continue their education, and they spend
far too much time behind screens in the form of entertainment. And, even for
those who want to continue to learn, they do not have access to a nearby tech
meeting hosted by a top firm speaking on the state of the art. If you're not
in SF or NY, then you do miss out on a lot of opportunities per people and
shared information.

* I am personally ashamed to say that I only realized the power and advantage of networking in recent years.

~~~
vinayan3
> Inhibiting this movement would arguably slow down progress. Don't think the
> lawmakers want to inhibit movement rather, probably they want to use these
> conclusions to encourage people to stay. The prosperity brought by progress
> can be spread across many regions.

> People from my hometown (pop. ~7500 in Midwest), do not realize that they
> are falling behind at an almost exponential rate. Many are working jobs that
> require common training, they do not continue their education

Do you think it's caused by the lack of other people who are moving ahead aka
role models or are there other factors(quality education etc...)?

I do feel and have seen despite being in the right place some people don't get
same opportunities for upward mobility despite being literally next door.

~~~
Pokepokalypse
Education, and lack of opportunity for those who are educated and talented.
(They will go where they can reap the most benefits for themselves). That top
talent - will also educate their co-workers. Not just the people they work
closely with, but everyone in their organization will receive great benefits
from collaborating with the people who collaborate with that top talent.

But most people working in the tech industry; (which is very highly
stovepiped) - will never experience that, and may only read about it.

When you're not fortunate enough to be employed in one of the top tech
industry companies, or in one of the hotspots where the industry is focused
(Silicon Valley, New York, Boston, Austin, Virginia, maybe Provo, Seattle) -
then you have to do all you can to use the internet to constantly learn and
grow your skills; but also, you have to try to constantly evangelize the same
attitude to your co-workers, and management. It is an exhausting job.

------
tomkat0789
My brain drain story: I got a nice engineering degree in the South, even had a
phd project supported by the local chemical plant. Why I left:

1\. GF/now wife had advanced degrees, and there were no advanced opportunities
for her in my area. She'd also have to leave the great opportunity she had in
her big northern city.

2\. The industry was randomly down when I graduated, so it didn't even make
much sense to stay even without my wife's situation. I found a job in my
wife's city where we're producing lots of tax income for one of the big
gainers on this map.

I think a key lesson from my case is to not have the local economy dependent
on one industry. The Gulf Coast is married to oil/chemicals, the Midwest was
in heavy manufacturing, WV in coal. A more diverse local economy means all the
married, educated couples can have an easier time finding careers for
themselves without one side having to sacrifice and feel like they've wasted
their huge educational investments.

------
mixedmath
I think there are interesting things to say about brain drain, and I'm
certainly under the impression that there is a tendency for people to move
away from the middle of the country and towards the coastal cities (and
apparently Texas, Colorado, and Illinois).

But I find the choices of units for these statistics to be very odd. For
example, I look at Massachusetts _Net_ difference in _Absolute_ terms in
_2017_ (where _stars_ indicate an option on the graph) and I see -16.41.

The article doesn't seem to say directly what -16.41 is, other than that it's
the "excess of highly-educated share of movers over highly-educated share of
entrants". So what is it?

Looking at the data they provide, I believe that they are subtracting two
different percentages of two separate numbers. It appears they examine all the
people who left and take the percentage of highly educated people in that
group (call this X); and they examine all the people who entered the state and
take the percentage of highly educated people (call this Y); and they return X
- Y.

This appears to me to be a terrible statistic in practice, especially if the
population of a state is either growing or shrinking.

For an example of an unbelievably misleading scenario, consider the fictional
state Hackernewsyork, with a population of 100 people (30 of whom are highly
educated). Say Hackernewsyork had exactly 1 person move away and she was
highly educated (so X = 100) and 10 people move in but only 5 were highly
educated (so Y = 50). Then they would report that X - Y = 50, a sign of
massive brain drain per the article --- when in fact both the number of highly
educated people in the state and the percentage of people in the state who are
highly educated went up.

~~~
theoh
I'm not sure about the justification for the X-Y figure, but it seems like
larger numbers would tend to make this kind of effect unlikely. If you assume
that in- and out-migration are not in equilibrium, but that the probability of
migrating is uniformly distributed over people of all levels of education,
then X-Y should be zero.

Obviously, it would be better to use net numbers (arrivals of highly educated
– departures of highly educated) and not attempt to normalise the numbers.

------
michelpp
Don't be fooled by the dissembling nature of this article.

It would be nice to think of this as just another data-fetish bauble, but this
article is part of a complex multi-dimensional game of politics. Who stands to
gain? What senators sit on the majority of the Joint Economic Committee and
why would they be selflessly taking their own states down a peg? Woe is the
drain... of their own making perhaps?

Maybe there is some major upcoming decision, say, one by the Supreme Court,
that will greatly effect how many, many billions of education dollars will be
dispersed by the federal government and to what "accredited" educational
institutions will be newly eligible for it?

------
js2
A couple related pieces by Richard Florida, referenced in this study:

"The Roots of the New Urban Crisis"

[https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/04/the-roots-of-the-
new-...](https://www.citylab.com/equity/2017/04/the-roots-of-the-new-urban-
crisis/521028/)

"Why America’s Richest Cities Keep Getting Richer"

[https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/richard...](https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/richard-
florida-winner-take-all-new-urban-crisis/522630/)

------
tomohawk
Living in one of the high rent areas, it's amazing how many people move here
for the work, and then leave once they've achieved their goals. Quality of
life and good pay don't seem to be collocated.

------
kchoudhu
Educated people with prospects by and large don't want to live in places where
they aren't respected or valued, news at 10.

------
Mirioron
Imagine what the effect of this is in the EU, where average income can differ
up to 5-10 times between the poor and rich countries. Freedom of movement
means they can still work in any of the EU countries.

~~~
T-A
That seems like an exaggeration. Sorting on the net PPP column at

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_by_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_European_countries_by_average_wage)

the lowest EU member is Bulgaria (1475), the highest is Luxembourg (3843);
that's a factor 2.6.

The EU also has much larger cultural barriers to movement than the US
(different languages, just to mention the most obvious one).

~~~
Mirioron
Just take a look at Bulgaria's population graph:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Bulgaria#/me...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Bulgaria#/media/File%3ABulgaria-
demography.png)

I very much question the validity of PPP in this case. Things are no doubt
cheaper in Bulgaria, but I'm fairly certain that electronics, cars etc are
going to cost roughly the same, because there's a free flow of goods. People
just make do with less.

Also keep in mind that people might move abroad to work there, but still come
back home once in a while. The effect on the economy is still going to be
similar. The median equivalised net income is just too different inside the
EU:
[http://appsso.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/nui/show.do?dataset=ilc_...](http://appsso.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/nui/show.do?dataset=ilc_di04&lang=en)

------
neilv
There's a related drain on big university cities/towns.

I stayed in Boston after CS-ish grad school, but pretty much all the other
students left immediately/shortly after finishing. If they didn't go to
professorships (the minority), it was usually SF or NYC.

The reasons, besides job opportunities, were young nightlife (e.g., dating
pool are frumpy nerds, bars/clubs/restaurants close up early by big city
standards, subway stops before last call), and quality of life for cost of
living (young STEM/med/law new-grads who want to be in-town often pay out the
nose to rent with roommates in a run-down old tinderbox apartment with lead
paint that was built 100 years ago as cheap housing for poor people), and
weather. And, thinking forward a couple years, a house/apartment big&nice
enough to start a family is outside the means of most people.

~~~
jeffbax
I don't see how moving from Boston to NYC or SF solves anything you're
referring to. Boston is younger than both and while expensive to live still
cheaper.

NYC is full of tinder box apartments. The dating pool in SF is way more
lopsided than the east coast. Uber made the subway thing less relevant (though
as someone who moved here and got older, the late hours also mean less to me
now than earlier)

Also MA is allegedly top ranked for millennials
[https://boston.cbslocal.com/2019/04/09/best-states-
millennia...](https://boston.cbslocal.com/2019/04/09/best-states-millennials-
massachusetts-worst-wallethub/)

Homes are expensive in MA but not cheaper in either SF or NY.

Boston also one of three US cities outside SV expected to be top 10 globally
in tech for the foreseeable future
[https://boston.curbed.com/2019/2/26/18240310/boston-
technolo...](https://boston.curbed.com/2019/2/26/18240310/boston-technology-
silicon-valley)

As for families, I don't see how either NY or CA is better off for education.

There's plenty of reasons to leave Boston for either of those cities, but the
ones you cite really don't make a whole lot of sense.

~~~
neilv
You could be right; I'm saying what people said. Jobs seems to be valid to me
(unless you're in biotech, rather than established dotcoms or doing a
startup). No one I know thinks nightlife anywhere compares to NYC, and the
people I know who moved from Boston to SF reported having a much better time
(and weather). I actually liked the Boston dating scene, before Tinder, but
I'm very much cafe and a walk.

------
threatofrain
I'm sure the parents want the kids getting out of brain-drain regions too. Why
ought kids stay?

~~~
burfog
Some may. I certainly don't agree. Those "brain-drain regions" are the places
where kids can afford to raise grandkids. Aside from weather, they are
generally nicer places to live.

~~~
gshdg
Only if there are well paying jobs there for their skills. And if they’re
satisfied with the school systems.

And different people have different ideas of what a “nice” place is to live.

------
throwaway713
Interesting how the South appears to have totally reversed course. In 1970, it
appears it was attracting talent. Now, it's losing talent quickly. That's
unfortunate.

~~~
dredmorbius
I'm wondering how much of that might have been the Great Migration: of (mostly
poorer, less educated) blacks leaving the South specifically because of
institutional oppression directly causing that lack of education and poverty.

~~~
loeg
Great Migration as a concept mostly predates 1970.

~~~
dredmorbius
Checking; Wikipedia gives dates as 1916 to 1970, peaking 1950-1970, so
precicsely within the data period mentioned:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Migration_%28African_Ame...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Migration_%28African_American%29)

------
yasp
I'm sure I will be downvoted for even mentioning his name, but Charles Murray
has been writing about this for decades.

~~~
vcavallo
bummer that just mentioning someone’s name requires this kind of prefacing

~~~
acjohnson55
It doesn't.

And it would be helpful if the commentary on Murray's thoughts exceeded the
meta-commentary on mentioning Murray's name.

------
Yhippa
I think the article hints at this but I wonder if civil political discourse is
over for people even despite the fact that people of differing beliefs don't
live next to each other and intermingle. It seems that enough people spend a
lot of time online and can hang out virtually in their circles anyway and get
caught up in groupthink.

------
cletus
I'm not sure I can make sense of the "Gross" figures. The "Net" figures are
easy to understand: people have generally moved to key urban areas, being CA,
NY, IL, TX, VA/MD, GA and CO.

Compare that to the Net figures from 1940 through 1990, which show a clear
migration to the Southern states. But I'm not even sure this is showing what
it suggests. Is it simply a proxy for population growth?

Or is this thing just a symptom that people in general have a much lower
chance of staying in the same state for 31-40 years?

I find the notion that people "self-select" into like-minded communities as
some sort of "social segregation" baseless, even laughable. The South still
has the echoes of slavery and (real) segregation that many have sought to
escape. The implication here is that people are abandoning their communities.
Are they though? What do they owe these states where they grew up? And are
they abandoning such states or essentially being chased away because they
simply don't conform to whatever cultural or religious norms dominate there?
This seems particular relevant to the smaller and more rural states.

Bear in mind that education seems to be a partial antidote to religious dogma
[1] in that people with more education tend to express religion less (although
this is complicated and Christians seem to somewhat buck this trend). But
given the cultural importance of religion in some communities, it seems like
your more educated citizens are also more likely to leave, no?

19th century America was one of small, rural towns. With the railroad and
homesteading these spread West. What probably began with the Industrial
Revolution seemed to turn into a tidal wave of urbanization following the
Second World War. Cities are just more efficient at delivering work
opportunities.

[1] [https://www.pewforum.org/2017/04/26/in-america-does-more-
edu...](https://www.pewforum.org/2017/04/26/in-america-does-more-education-
equal-less-religion/)

------
js2
_Conclusion

States which retain and attract highly-educated adults stand to reap
substantial economic benefits. At the same time, those that bleed much of
their homegrown talent will see their economic fortunes decline if they fail
to replace the leavers with highly-educated out-of-staters. Yet even if they
do manage to offset their losses, these states are still losing a vital source
of social capital.

What is more, the outmigration of highly-educated adults has almost certainly
played a role in the deterioration of civil society in struggling communities
across the country. And to the extent that the geographic mobility of the
highly-educated has increased social bifurcation, it has likely exacerbated
distrust of and intolerance toward people who hold different beliefs. One need
only glance at today’s polarized political environment to see these attitudes
on display.

Our research finds that states that are doing the best—low gross brain drain
and net brain gain—generally cluster along the Boston-Washington corridor and
on the West Coast: Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, California,
Oregon, and Washington. Other brain gain states are regional hubs—Hawaii,
Arizona, Colorado, Texas, and Illinois. Several of these states experienced
high gross brain drain and net brain drain in 1970, but have reversed course;
others have seen continued good prospects or improvements on one or both
measures. For the most part, these states are home to what Richard Florida
would describe as “winner-take-all cities.”

On the other hand, states in the Southeast, in the Rust Belt, and in other
parts of the country tend to fare much worse when it comes to retaining and
attracting the highly-educated. Several states in the Southeast—West Virginia,
Kentucky, Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana—had
low gross brain drain and net brain gain in 1970, but today generally
experience high gross brain drain as well as net brain drain. Most Rust Belt
states—Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Missouri—have
done poorly on these measures in both 1970 and 2017. Perhaps unsurprisingly,
states that defy these regional trends (for example, Illinois in the Rust
Belt, and Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia in the Southeast) seem to be
attracting highly-educated out-of-staters to their dynamic metropolitan hubs.

Brain drain has significant consequences—economic, yes, but also political and
cultural. By increasing social segregation, it limits opportunities for
disparate groups to connect. And by siphoning a source of economic innovation
from emptying communities, brain drain can also lead to crumbling institutions
of civil society. As those natives who have more resources leave, those left
behind may struggle to support churches, police athletic leagues, parent-
teacher associations, and local businesses. State and local policymakers are
understandably focused on the economic consequences of brain drain. But anyone
concerned about the health of associational life in America should worry that
what this report has mapped out, to some extent, is the geography of social
capital drain._

~~~
Rafuino
"As those natives who have more resources leave, those left behind may
struggle to support churches, police athletic leagues, parent-teacher
associations, and local businesses."

Huh... churches are the first thing that come to mind. Yep, this was
definitely written by a Utah senate staff.

~~~
burfog
I was out driving in rural Kentucky one day, along a long narrow gravel road
with sparse houses, and came across a church. The church had a sign
advertising a get-together with shotguns. I think it was skeet shooting,
possibly as a fundraiser.

I don't even go to church or have a shotgun, but I suddenly wanted to live
there and be a part of that community. I guess you could say that that sort of
genuine community made me envious.

------
dredmorbius
Brain drain is one of numerous dynamics highly similar to Gresham's law,
though with subtle implications. Goods movements, where mobile, follows direct
reward.

Brain-drain may be for economic, technological, social, and cultural reasons.
It's not uncommon for talent flows to be at least nominally bidirectional,
though with different and distinct motivating factors. The flight of
intellectual (and especially Jewish) European talent to the US before, during,
and after WWII contrasts with black American's migration from the US,
particularly though not just the South, to Europe. Contrast Fermi and Einstein
against James Baldwin and Nina Simone. Both oppression (negative driver) and
economic opportunity (positive) existed for each.

Within the British Commonwealth, substantial migratoon supported by _some_
cultural and political commonality (even where other strong differences
existed) facilitated vast human flows, generlly toward London, thpugh also
other centres.

Similar dynamics exist within countries as well, often (per Jane Jacobs) at
the urban regional level, particularly contrasted with rural regions. And hub
formation / centres of excellence tend to accelerate such consolidation (a
point Edward Glaeser argues relatively well, though with flaws).

Economic goods tend to move toward reward, and away from punishment or
restraint, though the dynamic once in flow tends to be self-sustaining, at
least for a time. There's much focus on positive network effects and growth,
less on decline. But the immigration surces of migration toward first the U.S.
Atlantic seaboard, and later the Western US, came from what had been earlier.
priods' dynamic hubs. Why those declined should be instructive study.

------
uneasy-sausage
So Ive got to ask, and I've failed to find answer through research for this
question, where the hell are all the educated young people at? I'm 28 and
relocated to Tampa Bay and I have no idea where my cohorts are here or in this
state.

~~~
burfog
Tampa is old retired people and the US Navy.

You want the other side of the state, near the middle of Brevard county. It's
a bunch of engineers working for DoD and NASA contractors.

------
loo9283
Asia is the future IMO. If you're smart and motivated there will be dozens of
"Silicon Valleys" there in 5-10 years.

------
Trias11
The article overthinks this.

I been brain drained by being offered higher pay.

You want to stop brain drain?

PAY!

Solved.

~~~
warent
This is an oversimplification of a more nuanced issue. For example, perhaps
the places that need it most can't afford it, and the places that can afford
it can only do so because they already have the existing market for it.

~~~
threwawasy1228
At the same time when a company in my home state, offers pay at 55k for
something that pays the equivalent of over double that on the coast there is
something wrong. Software companies don't magically have smaller margins based
on their geolocation if their user-base and contracts are global. In essence
their offer of half what is reasonable is pure greed because they know they
can get away with it in many cases.

There are lots of companies doing exactly this and driving costs lower in
areas where they can get away with it. I think a non-trivial amount of brain-
drain is simply paying people what they are worth regardless of how nuanced
the issue actually is.

------
briandear
I wonder why we consider “highly educated” to mean “college educated.” I know
plenty of college educated people unfit to manage a lemonade stand and plenty
of “lesser educated” people that own successful companies. Using a degree as a
proxy for intelligence is a mistake.

~~~
sonnyblarney
Level of education is a decent proxy for intelligence, in anything resembling
an academic context. More education is usually better.

It's why companies prefer hiring people with more education.

That said, I think many roles should not require a college degree for
application.

That one single thing might make a big difference - because as you hint there
are tons of otherwise great people who don't specifically have the education.

~~~
briandear
Is the IQ of a person with a masters degree in sociology higher than the IQ of
a non-degreee naval nuclear power technician? Yet the non-degrees nuke tech
would be considered “less educated” by the measures being used in this
discussion. A journeyman electrician often doesn’t have a degree, but they do
more intellectually challenging work/calculations than some Master of Social
Work person working at a local non-profit.

I deal with “highly educated” people in the mental health field on a daily
basis and some can barely write grammatically correct sentences: the support
tickets I get from people with PhDs and MA mental health professionals are
frequently atrocious. But my “uneducated” dad worked as a precision machinist
for NASA projects as well as teaching graduate students metallurgy. He’s
considered not highly educated, but only because he didn’t get a degree. His
education has zero to do with intelligence. That story isn’t an outlier
either. My point is that higher education attainment often has nothing to do
with intelligence beyond a base level, but more of class, financial resources
and desire. A naval fighter pilot with a bachelors degree, in my experience is
far more “educated” than someone with a masters in education, sociology,
poetry or whatever. Highly educated as a proxy for “desirable worker” is a
folly. Ambition, drive and work ethic are more valuable to a society than
simply someone who checked the boxes and got a university degree. Using a
university degree as a proxy for “desirable” worker is just snobbery and
intellectually lazy.

~~~
Pokepokalypse
Considered by whom? OPM - who sets the contractor pay-rate for these
positions? The classification system is very detailed and carefully calibrated
and it considers professional experience, certifications, and postsecondary
and graduate degrees, and the PhD or MA is not always necessarily higher than
an experienced technical engineer.

