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Inevitably, many countries have mounted efforts to counter the outflowing tide. An Israeli professional in the U.S. who considers going home, for example, receives a banquet of blandishments. The local consulate sends his or her resume to at least three prospective employers in Israel and helps the applicant finance a trip back home for job interviews. If the candidate accepts a position, the Israeli government makes available a host of benefits, including a handsome mortgage on a new house, loans to cover moving costs and a waiver of customs duties on everything except a car.
Other nations, by contrast, actually encourage emigration. Mexico's population is growing so fast that the country would have to create at least 750,000 jobs a year just to keep its unemployment rate from mounting further. Small wonder, then, that Mexico makes scant effort to assist the U.S. in reversing the tide. President Ferdinand Marcos has cited the annual exodus of 35,000 Filipinos to the U.S. as a help in offsetting two of his country's most obstinate problems: unemployment (now running at 45%) and a lopsided balance of payments. In South Korea, the departure of workers has eased some of the strains triggered by a population boom; in overcrowded Hong Kong (pop. 5.5 million), departing workers have reduced competition for professional jobs.
Few countries, however, can afford to take satisfaction from the departure of their best and brightest. In the process, they lose not only the resources of those who leave but also the confidence and commitment of those who remain. That loss is poignantly dramatized in an image common to most Third World capitals: the long line that snakes each weekday around the U.S. embassy. In Mexico, most applicants must wait eight years for a U.S. immigrant visa. In India, 140,000 people are on the waiting list for 20,000 annual U.S. immigrant visas. Most difficult of all, perhaps, is Hong Kong, where nearly 31,000 people have applied for the 600 places available each year. That could mean a wait of more than 50 years. And the line is growing longer.