E.g., 04/16/2024
E.g., 04/16/2024
Brain Waste & Credential Recognition

Brain Waste & Credential Recognition

_ImmHealth

Barriers to the recognition of foreign academic and professional credentials and experience are widely recognized as an impediment to the international mobility of skilled professionals and to immigrant integration. The result can be underemployment or unemployment for foreign professionals—a phenomenon referred to as "brain waste." As the research here demonstrates, the resulting waste of human capital represents a loss to employers, host communities, and immigrants themselves.

Recent Activity

Cover image for Integración socioeconómica de los migrantes y refugiados venezolanos
Reports
July 2021
By  Diego Chaves-González, Jordi Amaral and María Jesús Mora
Cover image for Socioeconomic Integration of Venezuelan Migrants and Refugees
Reports
July 2021
By  Diego Chaves-González, Jordi Amaral and María Jesús Mora
The Integration of Immigrant Health Professionals: Looking beyond the COVID-19 Crisis
Policy Briefs
April 2021
By  Jeanne Batalova, Michael Fix and José Ramón Fernández-Peña
Arrivals from Tashkent, Uzbekistan, depart a train in Moscow.
HealthCare BrainWaste Commentary CDC
Commentaries
December 2020
By  Michael Fix, Jeanne Batalova and José Ramón Fernández-Peña

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ImmigrantFarmWorker_LauraElizabethPohl_Bread fortheWorld

On the frontlines of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic yet also more disproportionately affected by the virus and with reduced health-care access, immigrants in the United States have largely found themselves blocked from federal economic relief. As states and philanthropic groups seek to plug the gap, this article examines conditions and changing policies around immigration and the coronavirus response.

Indian nurses in a classroom

India is the world's largest source for immigrant physicians, and for Indian-trained doctors and nurses the allure of working abroad is strong despite an acute domestic shortage of health-care workers. Against this pull, the Indian government has enacted a number of policies to limit and regulate the emigration of health-care professionals, though these have been more ad hoc in nature and not part of a fully realized strategy.

Refugees attend a job training fair

After receiving more than 2 million asylum seekers in 2015-16, European countries are turning to the task of integrating the newcomers, including getting refugees into work. This article explores labor market integration of refugees in five Northern European countries—Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden—drawing key lessons for today from the experiences of earlier groups of humanitarian arrivals.

_BrainWaste+Credentialing

The number of college-educated immigrants in the United States has more than tripled in the last two decades. Asians accounted for 46 percent of the 10.5 million college-educated immigrants, with India the top origin country. This Spotlight article examines key indicators of the college-educated population, including international students and high-skilled H-1B visa holders.

2015 04 17 10.44.09
With rising inflows of humanitarian and economic migrants, Norway faces a series of integration challenges. In conversation with the Migration Information Source, Solveig Horne, Norway's Minister of Children, Equality, and Social Inclusion discusses her work on integration policy, from the importance of language training and a feeling of belonging, to the protection of immigrant women and resettlement of asylum seekers.

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EventPH 2015.3.5 Adult Education, English and Skills Training Webinar   Carlos Rosario ESL group work
Video, Audio
March 5, 2015

This webinar, with perspectives from MPI, the National Partnership for New Americans, and the National Skills Coalition, looks at the role of adult education and English language and skills training in the immigrant integration process.

EventPH 2012.02.12 The Skills of Immigrants3
Video, Audio
February 12, 2015

A report release examining PIAAC data on the skills of U.S. immigrant adults and whether there is a gap with native-born adults, and discussion of how these skills relate to key immigrant integration outcomes such as employment, income, access to training, and health.

EVENTPH 2014.11.18   Better Work for Immigrants in EU2
Video, Audio
November 18, 2014

A day-long conference in Brussels, co-sponsored by the International Labour Office and the European Commision’s Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs, and Inclusion, where panelists discuss the dynamics by which migrants get stuck in low-skilled work, and the role of training and employment services in helping them progress in their occupations.

EVENTPH 2014.5.14 State Level Initiatives to Address Brain Waste
Audio
May 14, 2014

A discussion of data compiled by MPI on "brain waste" among foreign-trained nurses, engineers, and teachers, with updates on three state-level initiatives—in Illinois, Massachusetts, and Washington State—that are working to analyze and address challenges faced by immigrants and refugees with degrees and training in these fields.

IMG_2563_Crop
Video, Audio
December 12, 2013

This panel discussion focuses on the circulation of skilled immigrant professionals and the recognition of foreign qualifications in the United States and Europe.

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Recent Activity

Expert Q&A, Audio
November 12, 2021

In this World of Migration podcast episode, MPI Senior Fellow Michael Fix speaks with Senior Policy Analyst Julia Gelatt about the fiscal impacts of immigration, the importance of immigrant integration, how a greater focus on credential recognition could allow immigrants to more fully utilize the academic and professional skills they bring with them, and much more.

Reports
July 2021

Más de cinco años después de que números importantes de venezolanos empezaron a salir de su país, se ha vuelto cada vez más claro que muchos de ellos permanecerán en los países a los que migraron, si no permanentemente, por un largo periodo. ¿Cómo se están integrando en países claves de América del Sur? Este informe evalúa la inclusión económica, el acceso a la salud y a la educación, y la cohesión social, así como las condiciones cambiantes a causa de la pandemia.

Reports
July 2021

More than five years since Venezuelans began emigrating in large numbers, it is becoming clear that many plan to stay abroad for an extended time, if not permanently. How are they settling into life in key South American destination countries? This report explores their economic inclusion, access to education and health care, social cohesion, and more, and how conditions have changed amid the pandemic.

Audio, Webinars
June 24, 2021

During this webcast, experts discuss findings from a report examining at U.S. and state levels the underemployment of college graduates by nativity and by race and ethnicity, in the process revealing patterns of economic inequality. The conversation includes immigrant and employer voices who explore the promising strategies that exist to mitigate this brain waste for the benefit of the U.S. economy, local communities, and the workers themselves.

Reports
June 2021

While the educational credentials of recent immigrants to the United States have steadily risen, licensing and other barriers continue to prevent many college-educated immigrants from working at their skill level. This underutilization is particularly acute for Black and Latino college graduates, even after controlling for sociodemographic and educational characteristics. This report offers a U.S. and state profile of underemployment, and possible policy remedies.

Policy Briefs
April 2021

The U.S. health-care workforce came under incredible strain during the COVID-19 pandemic. Longer-term trends—including the aging and increasing diversity of the U.S. population, and health-care worker retirement—are also shaping demand for services and the supply of health workers. This issue brief looks at how the skills and expertise of underutilized immigrant and refugee health professionals in the United States can be better leveraged to meet these challenges.

Articles

In recent decades Russia has been increasingly reliant on Central Asian migrant workers. Those workers, in turn, have sent back remittances that have been crucial for their countries of origin. Since 2015, many of these ex-Soviet countries have come together in the Eurasian Economic Union to solidify their bonds and ease migrants' passage to Russia. This article explores the bloc and how it reflects Russia's role in the region.

Commentaries
December 2020

With the U.S. health-care system buckling under the resurgent COVID-19 outbreak, policymakers could undertake efforts to enable skilled, underemployed international health-care professionals to practice. This would both make the health system more resilient and flexible, as well as introduce critical language and cultural skills important during the contact-tracing and vaccine rollout phases of the pandemic response, as this commentary explores.

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