Market for ph.d.'s in engineering and the contribution of foreign ph.d.'s to research productivity in Turkey

Official URL: http://192.168.1.20/record=b1304400 (Table of Contents)

The main aim of this paper is to study the consequences of the infamous Brain Drain in Turkey in graduate education context. Following the recent literature which centers on the positive outcomes of the emigration of skilled personnel from a developing country, we investigate the possibility of a Beneficial Brain Drain through academic scholars which have obtained their doctoral degrees abroad and returned to Turkey upon completion of their study. With a rich dataset, we first present a detailed overview of the current Ph.D. Market in the engineering faculties of Turkish universities. Second, we conduct estimations to explore the determinants of academic research in Turkey. Along with others, we mainly look upon the relationship between higher education obtained abroad and academic research productivity. Moreover, we also investigate the so-called spillover effect of foreign education on research among scholars with a doctoral degree from Turkey. The results show that foreign Ph.D. shares indeed have a positive correlation with academic research conducted in Turkish universities, both on quantity and quality aspects.