Trump's Travel Ban Puts America's Brain Drain in Hyperdrive

[babylonsister]

Trump’s Travel Ban Puts America’s Brain Drain in Hyperdrive
Academics and science advocates fear that research will be upended and industries disrupted now that the policy is here to stay.
Sam Stein
Tanya Basu
06.27.18 4:42 AM ET

snip//

“We’re deterring people from coming here,” said Vivek Wadhwa, a professor of entrepreneurship at the Pratt School of Engineering at Stanford University. “America is now considered hostile to foreigners. Before they can even want to come, they’re turned away.”

The ripple effects of that hostility could be profound, Wadhwa predicted. In the 2012 paper he co-authored, titled “America's New Immigrant Entrepreneurs: Then and Now,” Wadhwa noted that more than a quarter of American engineering and technology startups were founded by immigrants and that in Silicon Valley, nearly half of startups are immigrant-founded. When it came to patents, more than 60 percent of filings were done by immigrants; over 40 percent of international patent applications on behalf of the American government included an author who wasn’t an American citizen.

The travel ban could fundamentally change the American economy by drying up that source of innovation.

“With this brain drain happening, we’re arming our competitors in China and South America with the greatest threat to American security,” said Wadhwa. In particular, there’s the fact that “we’ve been training the smartest students from China and sending them back home,” he said. “China is catching up to America in artificial intelligence and gene editing and robotics. We never thought China would be able to compete with the U.S. but China is on par with the U.S. right now.”

Even before the Supreme Court’s decision on Tuesday, the effects of the ban were become evident in a variety of fields. Dr. Atul Grover, the executive vice president of Association of American Medical Colleges, said that over the preceding year, there had been about a 22 percent drop in the number of people requesting a student visa from the seven countries on the president’s list.

“For a one year difference that is pretty significant,” Grover said.

But, he added, the actual impact is likely to be even more severe. He expected prospective medical students from countries not on the current list to balk at applying to schools in the United States out of fear that their nations may be added by Trump at a later date. In addition, students with spouses from countries currently under the ban would have to weigh the possibility of splitting up their family if they choose to study in the United States.

“We are already looking at a physician shortage,” Grover said. “While we have increased the number of graduates from U.S. medical schools, we are still reliant on international graduates to serve people, particularly in underserved areas. That will be harder and harder to fill these positions if we have fewer applicants. Or it may be that these applicants are as qualified as they are in the past. We’ve had our choice of the best and the brightest in the past. But now, people might look elsewhere.”

more...

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-travel-ban-puts-americas-brain-drain-in-hyperdrive?ref=home

[FBaggins]

1. This makes sense in theory

But are we really getting that many doctors and entrepreneurs from Yemen/Somalia/etc.

[babylonsister]

3. But are we deterring people who live

overseas from coming here because there's always a chance the ban will be expanded? IOW, this ban could and probably has caused people to reconsider their choices.

[llmart]

5. Exactly.

Muslims living in any country would probably think twice about coming here and so would other people. The perception is who would want to live in a country where anyone "different" isn't going to be welcomed? This is the Trump legacy already and it's only going to get worse.

[FBaggins]

6. If we are, those numbers are available

One would assume that if the authors could make that point... they would.

[braddy]

2. Really? The travel ban is for 7 countries, North Korea, Syria, Yemen, Libya, Somalia,Venezuela and

Iran. I think we can survive it for a while and still be an advanced country.

[Ron Obvious]

4. I'd say those countries need them more than we do. n/t