Brain Drain crisis in Africa

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I’ve always called this brain drain thing a crisis, and I found a comment on an article in the Economist that highlights this. See below.

"So that’s it? That’s the simple solution? More trade, fewer tariffs, break up the monopolies, and voila, all poverty is gone. Why didn’t anybody think of that? Economists really do live in the clouds.

The biggest difference btwn rich and poor countries is the human capital - both in those who govern and those who are governed. The only way countries can climb out of poverty is if they have a good government run by smart, honest people, presiding over lots of other smart, honest, hard working people. This will never happen as long as brain drain continues at its current pace from poor countries like India, Africa, Central America to the rich countries.

If the rich world really is that concern with equal development everywhere, we should start by greatly curtailing immigration from the 3rd world. These people’s healthy body and brainpower are needed much more in their native country than in the rich world. Instead of taking the easy way out of importing foreign talents, rich countries should do the hard work and develop our own talent by fixing our education system and encourage hard work from a young age.

The single biggest thing we could do to equalize development and eliminate poverty in the 3rd world is by sending home all the able body and brainy immigrants back to their home countries to fix their own country.

The Economist cannot possibly on the one hand encourage unlimited immigration from the 3rd world to the rich world, while at the same time calling for more equal development everywhere. It’s like talking out of both sides of your mouth. Those two are directly in contradiction.

Immigration is just the rich world’s new way of continuing to plunder from the developing world, only instead of stealing their natural resources, we are now stealing their human resources. It exacerbates unequal development around the world, making the rich world richer, poor world poorer. After all, who is left to govern when the rich, smart and young leave the first chance they get? The corrupt and evil with the big guns, to rule over the poor, the sick, the old, the dumb and the weak. The Economist need to grow a brain and some balls and seriously consider this issue, rather than mindlessly repeating the Politically Correct mumbo jumbo of more immigration, more immigration, immigration will solve all the world’s problems. Guess what? It doesn’t. It only creates more lopsided development the world over."

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I think making a difference requires two things: the willingness to do something in the first place and the tenacity to persevere when things aren’t going according to plan.

Sending people back home against their will creates neither.

You lost me at when you said the solution to our problems are the west’s immigration policies.

The problem isn’t smart people not coming back home. The problem is we aren’t interested in making a difference; we all want a better life.

There’s other places in the world that will pay a premium for smart, talented people. Very few would refuse great personal gain for the national interest. Brilliant lawyers aren’t leaving Europe to help our legal system. Doctors aren’t leaving America to come open up hospitals here. Engineers aren’t leaving their firms to design a better Nigeria.

That’s not the west’s fault. That’s ours.

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Yeah skip the sending people back. And these aren’t my words btw. Yes we want better lives but the west’s open and stringent immigration policies have successfully taken the brightest Africans generation after generation. It isn’t an individual problem just a systemic one.

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Had to scan that part twice, you kidding me bro!?

What a point!? That’s a brazen claim of entitlement.

Why would the ‘rich countries’ fix our educational system for us? That aside.

Immigration or not, individual mobility to greener pastures is as primal as it is natural.

The instinct that drives a young upstart to leave that job s/he started after grad (at elemental pay) to embrace an opportunity to work in a Chevron, is not different from the one that drives a respected individual to take up either a scholarship or an employment with an Intel corp in the US, thus migrating.

It’s nothing to be ashamed of.

We all need to buckle down and deal with our own shit while fostering a sense of collective responsibility on nation building, not leaving out those outside this shore.

@sop_DDy if you take into consideration what Nigerians in diaspora remit each year back home, you wouldn’t count it all as exploitation.

1 Like
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Read this from a Westerners perspective, not my words lool. The comment as a whole has truth just read it broadly. The part that interested me was how brain drain enriches the West at the expense of Africa and India.

I think people are misreading this. It’s an AMERICAN that wrote that comment not me.

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Should have cited the article then.

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It’s a comment under an article.