Tapping the Talents of Highly Skilled Immigrants in the United States: Takeaways from Experts Summit

Migration Policy Institute (MPI) research finds that nearly 2 million, or one-quarter, of immigrant college graduates are either unemployed or work in jobs that require no more than a high school degree. This brain waste comes with a price tag of $10 billion in forgone federal, state, and local taxes each year. But there are also harder-to-quantify costs such as the impact of talent shortage on labor productivity and business competitiveness--a perennial challenge reported by U.S. employers. This document seeks to capture the deliberations of a summit meeting convened by MPI on June 14, 2017, that drew together more than 30 leading experts, practitioners, and government and foundation officials focused on the topics of immigration and U.S. employment trends. The participants shared their collective U.S. and international knowledge and discussed how to maximize the recognition and use of the human capital of highly skilled immigrants in the United States. The participants were also called upon to think creatively about the future path of those seeking to address the issue of brain waste. This report summarizes and builds on selected themes that emerged from discussions at the summit, namely: (1) Changing Demographic, Economic, and Political Context; (2) Opportunities for Reform; and (3) Future Research Directions.