Why the U.S. Is Losing Foreign Graduates

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The Pull of Friends and Family

After finishing their studies, large numbers of foreign students have traditionally chosen to stay in the U.S. to work full-time or pursue postdoctoral work. But that dynamic appears to be changing, the report says. Of the survey respondents, very few would like to stay in the U.S. permanently; only 6% of Indian, 10% of Chinese, and 15% of Europeans. The largest group of respondents wants to return home within five years—45% of Indian, 40% of Chinese, and 30% of European students.

The strongest reason students cited for leaving the U.S. was the desire to be with friends and family at home. The second most important factor was the perception that economic opportunities at home were better. Chinese students, in particular, strongly feel the best job opportunities lie in their home country, with 52% saying their home country has the best job opportunities, vs. 32% of Indian respondents and 26% of European respondents.

The least important factor in their decision to leave the U.S. was discrimination, followed by the difficulty of getting a visa to stay in the U.S. and availability of jobs in the U.S., according to the report. Still, the vast majority of foreign student respondents—85% of Indians and Chinese and 72% of Europeans—said they are concerned about obtaining work visas.

Too Soon to Draw Conclusions

Baris Guzel, a 25-year-old candidate for a master's in engineering management at Duke University and a student of Wadhwa, says the difficulty in obtaining a visa to stay in the U.S. for several years is the main reason he plans to leave the country after he graduates in May. Originally from Turkey and currently on a J-1 student visa, Guzel says he and four other friends are planning to start a company called AmPoll.com that offers a free online tool to create user surveys. He is considering starting the company in Germany. "It is hard for foreigners to get a job these days [in the U.S.]," say Guzel. "In Germany, it is easy to obtain a working visa."

B. Lindsay Lowell, director of policy studies at Georgetown University's Institute for the Study of International Migration, says it is difficult to draw conclusions from the Wadhwa study because of the methodology. "Shy of systematic administrative data or reasonably random samples, I'm skeptical that we can really say anything too definitive about the number or nature of the apparent return migration," he says.

He cautions against making policy decisions without more reliable data. He believes that if more students are in fact returning to their home countries, the predominant reasons are probably economic. "I think [return migration] reflects the state of the U.S. economy at the moment," he says. "The labor market is pretty soft, and corporations are tightening their belts. At the same time, India is apparently doing pretty well. So why not return?"

Herbst is a reporter for BusinessWeek in New York.