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Will the U.S. Keep the Best and the Brightest (as Post-docs)? Career and Location Preferences of Foreign STEM PhDs

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  • Ina Ganguli
  • Patrick Gaulé

Abstract

We estimate the career and location preferences of students in U.S. doctoral programs in a major STEM field – chemistry. Our analysis is based on novel survey conducted in 2017 of 1,605 current Chemistry doctoral students enrolled in the top 54 U.S. research intensive universities. First, we estimate the career preferences of foreign and U.S. STEM students for different types of post-graduation jobs – postdocs, industry, or teaching positions – using both hypothetical choice methods and more standard Likert measures of preferences for different careers. We find that foreign students are generally more interested in academic careers than U.S. students, even when controlling for ability and comparing students from similar subfields and programs. Next, we estimate students’ location preferences using a hypothetical choice method: we ask respondents to choose between two postdoc job offers, where one offer is in the U.S. and one is abroad. We find that foreign students have a stronger preference for U.S. locations even after controlling for ability and career preferences. Our results suggest the U.S. is managing to retain talented foreign graduate students for postdoc positions.

Suggested Citation

  • Ina Ganguli & Patrick Gaulé, 2018. "Will the U.S. Keep the Best and the Brightest (as Post-docs)? Career and Location Preferences of Foreign STEM PhDs," NBER Working Papers 24838, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24838
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Gaulé, Patrick, 2014. "Who comes back and when? Return migration decisions of academic scientists," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 124(3), pages 461-464.
    2. Alexandre Mas & Amanda Pallais, 2017. "Valuing Alternative Work Arrangements," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(12), pages 3722-3759, December.
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    5. Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes & Delia Furtado, 2019. "Settling for Academia?: H-1B Visas and the Career Choices of International Students in the United States," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 54(2), pages 401-429.
    6. Shulamit Kahn & Megan J. MacGarvie, 2016. "How Important Is U.S. Location for Research in Science?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(2), pages 397-414, May.
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J6 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers
    • O3 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights

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