Brain Gain

For most of the 20th century, Canada’s loss of highly qualified and experienced professionals to the U.S. labor market has been a vexing problem. With the signing of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) in 1989 and NAFTA in 1994, this “brain drain” problem only intensified when the newly created H-1B and TN visa greased the wheels for university educated Canadians to seek employment, and then residence, in the U.S.

That trend, however, has begun to reverse in recent years. According to the National Post, Canada experienced a net loss, on average, of roughly 15,000 permanent residents to the U.S. each year between 2001 and 2010. Over the next decade, that loss steadily diminished. By 2014, the deficit dipped below 10,000 for the first time and, in 2021, hit a record low of roughly 3,300.

This year, Canada took aim at kicking that trend into high gear by appealing to not only U.S. residents but also H-1B visa holders in the U.S. In July, Canada launched a pilot program that allowed up to 10,000 H-1B Specialty Occupations holders to apply for a three-year open work permit in Canada. The program reached capacity on its fir st day. In part, that enthusiasm was driven by the fact that the U.S. has a massive backlog of H-1B and green card applicants, many of whom are facing a lifetime waiting period.

The pilot program is part of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s (IRCC) larger Tech Talent Strategy, which aims, through various measures, to turn Canada into the destination for the world’s IT professionals, of which foreign trained engineers will likely make up a sizable number.

Should Canada’s strategy work as expected, the IRCC’s new policy will mesh with Professional Engineers Ontario’s decision, announced in May 2023, to become the first provincial engineering regulatory association to drop Canadian work exper ience as a requirement to become a licensed engineer.

And none too soon, given that there are now many more seniors than children in Canada and record numbers of experienced engineers will reach retirement age in the next 10-15 years. According to Engineers Canada, approximately 302,550 hold a professional engineering designation in Canada, as of 2021 – a number that will hopefully swell to offset the looming loss of Baby Boomer and Gen X engineers. While intense immigration has exacerbated the housing crisis in Canada’s largest cities in the past few years, expanding Canada’s tech talent, engineering and otherwise, addresses a deeper crisis that’s been brewing for decades.

MIKE MCLEOD Editor

mmcleod@design-engineering.com

Editorial Board

DR. ALAIN AUBERTIN

President & CEO, Canada Consortium for Aerospace Research and Innovation in Canada (CARIC)

DR. MARY WELLS, P.ENG

Dean, Faculty of Engineering / Professor, Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering; University of Waterloo

AJAY BAJAJ, P.ENG

President and CEO, Rotator Products Limited; Past President and Board Member, Power Transmission Distributors Association (PTDA)

DR. ISHWAR PURI, P.ENG Vice President of Research; Engineering Professor, University of Southern California

NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2023

Volume 68, No.6 design-engineering.com

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