STEM ImmigrationThe Only Way for the U.S. to Maintain Tech Edge Over China: STEM Immigration

Talent is critical to innovation, and America’s deep pool of skilled scientists and engineers is a key component of its technological primacy. But today, for the first time in decades, U.S. leadership is under serious threat. Reaping the fruits of significant long-term investments, China’s supply of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) talent now rivals that of the United States, both in terms of quantity and quality. Given current trends, it is inevitable that China will overtake the United States in purely domestic terms—if it has not done so already.

A new report from CSIS — Winning the Tech Talent Competition: Without STEM Immigration Reforms, the United States Will Not Stay ahead of China – says that the most powerful—and perhaps only—lasting and asymmetric American advantage is its ability to attract and retain international talent, a feat China has not been able to replicate despite extensive efforts.

But the U.S. government risks squandering that advantage through poor immigration policy. “Without significant reforms to STEM immigration, the United States will struggle to maintain long-term competitiveness and achieve near-term technology priorities such as semiconductor supply chain security, leadership in artificial intelligence (AI), and clean energy innovation.,” says Remco Zwetsloot, the Trustee Fellow in the International Security Program at CSIS and the author of the report.

Here is the report’s Executive Summary:

Talent is critical to innovation, and America’s deep pool of skilled scientists and engineers is a key component of its technological primacy. But today, for the first time in decades, U.S. leadership is under serious threat. Reaping the fruits of significant long-term investments, China’s supply of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) talent now rivals that of the United States, both in terms of quantity and quality. Given current trends, it is inevitable that China will overtake the United States in purely domestic terms—if it has not done so already.

The most powerful—and perhaps only—lasting and asymmetric American advantage is its ability to attract and retain international talent, a feat China has not been able to replicate despite extensive efforts. But the U.S. government risks squandering that advantage through poor immigration policy. Without significant reforms to STEM immigration, the United States will struggle to maintain long-term competitiveness and achieve near-term technology priorities such as semiconductor supply chain security, leadership in artificial intelligence (AI), and clean energy innovation.

Part 1 of this paper provides data that supports these claims. Findings include:

·  By 2025, China is projected to nearly double annual U.S. STEM PhD output (77,000 versus 40,000 graduates per year, respectively). Counting only domestic U.S. students, China would more than triple American numbers.

·  China already far outpaces America in bachelor’s and master’s graduates; in 2019, China granted 1,886,000 bachelor’s degrees and 326,000 master’s degrees in STEM fields, compared to 445,000 and 171,000, respectively, for the United States

·  The quality of Chinese education has improved significantly over the last decade, especially at the PhD level. In 2020, 71 Chinese universities ranked in the top 500 globally, up from 23 in 2010. Even when quantity comparisons are limited to graduates from these higher-quality universities, China still graduates more STEM PhDs than the United States does today.

·  America remains far more attractive to international scientists and engineers than China. While available data is imperfect, surveys suggest 60 percent of advanced STEM talent based abroad would consider moving to the United States, compared to around 10 percent for China. These figures have changed little over the past decade.

·  Immigration policies are harming America’s technology talent pool. Visa issues have contributed to a recent drop in international STEM enrollments. For instance, around 60 percent of U.S.-trained international AI PhDs who left the country after graduating said that immigration issues were relevant to their decision to leave.

·  These realities are creating a budding bipartisan consensus that U.S. STEM immigration reform is “a national security imperative,” as the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence recently put it. But this consensus has yet to be turned into action.

Part 2 of this report identifies three overarching policy priorities that should be at the center of a twenty-first-century international talent strategy and proposes several concrete legislative and executive policy options for pursuing these priorities (see table below). Along with much-needed domestic investments, these policies would go a long way toward maintaining and expanding America’s technological superiority.