Brain drain and job dissatisfaction. Evidence from a developing country
Resumen:
We study the extent to which individuals' reported job dissatisfaction could drive brain drain in a developing country, taking Uruguay as a case study. We focus on a particular group of highly skilled workers, those holding a PhD and working in research, due to their relevance for development. This group has not been previously addressed in the literature on brain drain. We build on previous literature and address causality by estimating seemingly unrelated equations with instrumental variables. Our results point to a negative causal relationship between job satisfaction and a researcher's desire to emigrate. We also find that researchers embedded in international academic networks are more prone to report an intention to emigrate. Our policy recommendations are in line with those aiming to increase pecuniary and non-pecuniary aspects of the job, and to implement complex policies of international collaboration with researchers living abroad in order to at least partially offset brain drain.
En este trabajo analizamos en qué medida la insatisfacción laboral reportada por los individuos podría impulsar la fuga de cerebros en un país en desarrollo, tomando a Uruguay como caso de estudio. Nos centramos en un grupo particular de trabajadores altamente calificados, aquellos que cuentan con un título de doctorado y se dedican a la investigación, debido a su relevancia para el desarrollo. Este grupo no ha sido suficientemente abordado por la literatura sobre fuga de cerebros.Aportamos a la literatura previa a partir del análisis de estimaciones de ecuaciones aparentemente no relacionadas con variables instrumentales, que permite abordar la causalidad desde la insatisfacción laboral a la intención emigratoria. Nuestros resultados muestran una relación causal negativa entre la satisfacción laboral y el deseo del investigador de emigrar. También encontramos que los investigadores integrados en redes académicas internacionales son más propensos a reportar intención a emigrar. Nuestras recomendaciones de políticas están en línea con aquellas que apuntan a aumentar los aspectos pecuniarios y no pecuniarios del trabajo, y a implementar políticas complejas de colaboración internacional con investigadores que viven en el extranjero para compensar al menos parcialmente la fuga de cerebros.
| 2023 | |
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Brain drain Uruguay Migration Human capital Subjective well-being Bienestar subjetivo Migración Fuga de cerebros Capital humano ECONOMIA INTERNACIONAL ECONOMIA LABORAL DESARROLLO ECONOMICO |
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| Inglés | |
| Universidad de la República | |
| COLIBRI | |
| https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12008/41951 | |
| Acceso abierto | |
| Licencia Creative Commons Atribución - No Comercial - Sin Derivadas (CC - By-NC-ND 4.0) |
| Sumario: | We study the extent to which individuals' reported job dissatisfaction could drive brain drain in a developing country, taking Uruguay as a case study. We focus on a particular group of highly skilled workers, those holding a PhD and working in research, due to their relevance for development. This group has not been previously addressed in the literature on brain drain. We build on previous literature and address causality by estimating seemingly unrelated equations with instrumental variables. Our results point to a negative causal relationship between job satisfaction and a researcher's desire to emigrate. We also find that researchers embedded in international academic networks are more prone to report an intention to emigrate. Our policy recommendations are in line with those aiming to increase pecuniary and non-pecuniary aspects of the job, and to implement complex policies of international collaboration with researchers living abroad in order to at least partially offset brain drain. |
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