Human capital flight from Iran
Emigration of highly educated people from Iran / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Human capital flight from Iran has been a significant phenomenon since the Islamic Revolution of 1979.[1] According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Iran had a substantial drain of highly skilled and educated individuals (15 percent) in the early 1990s.[2] More than 150,000 Iranians left the Islamic Republic every year in the early 1990s,[3] and an estimated 25 percent of all Iranians with post-secondary education then lived abroad in OECD-standard developed countries.[2][4] A 2009 IMF report indicated that Iran tops the list of countries that are losing their academic elite, with a loss of 150,000 to 180,000 specialists—roughly equivalent to a capital loss of US$50 billion.[5][6][7] In addition, the political crackdown following the 2009 Iranian election protests is said to have created a "spreading refugee exodus" of Iranian intelligentsia.[8] It has also been reported that the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States is running a covert operation code-named "Braindrain Project" with the aim of luring away nuclear-oriented Iranian talent, thus undermining Iran's nuclear program.[9]
In 2024 Iranian government stopped issuing visa to people fleeing the country.[10][11]