The U.S. Brain Drain: How Policies Are Driving Talent Away

Yeah, his brain's cooked

“Mr. President, there was a car bomb in Moscow this morning that killed a Russian general,” one reporter noted over the sound of the plane. “Do you have any reaction to that?”

“Who killed what?” Trump asked.

“Russian general, killed by a car bomb,” someone reiterated.

“Wow,” the president replied. “No, I just heard– you’re just telling me that for the first time. Where did this take place?”

“It took place in Moscow,” came the reply.

...........................................


Time: “Mr. President, you were showing us the new paintings you have behind us. You put all these new portraits. One of them includes John Adams. John Adams said we’re a government ruled by laws, not by men. Do you agree with that?”

Trump: “John Adams said that? Where was the painting?”

Time: “It’s right here.”

 

Starting to get some real data.

A Georgia Tech study shows that there is a net out-migration from states with total abortion bans which is particularly acute among single-person households. Even considering all other migration patterns, including COVID issues, they found total-ban states lost about 4.9 people per 10,000 residents every quarter, which comes out to a total loss of almost 1.5%. The numbers are fairly consistent across the months since Dobbs. Doesn't sound like much, but it is the equivalent of a super-high murder rate or lots of air pollution. When you consider that most are probably female and young, the long-term demographic, economic, and property values impacts can't be understated.

A notable but lesser percentage of family households also out-migrated.

Note: These are permanent relocations, not kids going to college out of state.

(This link is a draft. The final paper is behind a paywall: https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w33328/w33328.pdf)

Another study by the American Association of Medical Colleges finds that states with total abortion bans saw drops in applications for residency to the tune of 10.7%. Emergency medicine residency applications were down the most at 21.4% while the much smaller group of OB/GYN specializations were down by 10.5%.

https://www.aamcresearchinstitute.org/media/4846/download?attachment

This was entirely predictable and a result of really bad policy: brain drain from red states to blue and from US to other countries. Haven't seen much on non-academic migration to other countries, but I'm confident it's happening.