Pakistan’s recent case of economic migration is the most stressful modern and legal case of mass exodus of educated youth which is leaving Pakistan due to volatile situation and uncertain future.
We used to see cases like Syria, Iraq where people were leaving due to war or disaster when they have to fear for their lives but this Pakistani case is completely different from what we used to see. It’s not simple mass exodus due to disaster or war where unskilled labor is leaving country instead it is the case of educated skilled personal who are leaving their country due to hopelessness and desire for better future.
Pakistan’s Economic Migration Spectrum
What we assessed from our study is that almost 1 million people have left their country in 2022 alone while we are expecting far bigger number in 2023 as their economic crises is worsening. Some people even reported that this number might cross 2 million in next year because there almost more than 3 millions visa applications in pipeline right now and most of them will be approved in this year.
A quoted by http://www.context.news
” More than 800,000 Pakistanis left the country of 220 million to take up jobs last year, according to regulatory and monitoring body the Bureau of Emigration and Overseas Employment, up from a pre-pandemic total of 625,876 in 2019, and 382,439 the year before that.
Many more leave for education or other reasons, and do not return “
How Pakistan Economic migration started
In most of the previous cases of economic migration happened instantly or triggered by a single incident but in Pakistan this crises was brewing for quite a while. With the terrorism inflicting the economy along with dreadful corrupting of their ruling elites, dead end of debts for country and Poor currency which is right now The worst performing currency in the world
Devastating floods last year was almost like a final nail in the coffin, which ultimately caused exponential increase in the prices of the daily use commodities include shortages of staple foods linked to a dearth of dollars and persistently high inflation that tipped 24% in January.
Pakistan is struggling to quell default fears in domestic and international markets, with a $1.1 billion bailout tranche from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) stuck due to differences over a programme review that should have been completed in November.
Demoralized Youth and Economic Migration
Right now whenever you talk with youth all you get the feeling of hopelessness, desperation of young. They all have lost hope in their country and many feel Pakistan as a lost cause with apparent anger against Politicians and most importantly their Military establishment. They feel that ruling elites and power circles of Pakistan don’t care about them while their establishment is getting most of the economic budget with the least focus on Education and Job creation for them.
After graduating from their respective universities they were hoping for better future but right now there frustration in the air with the unemployment on the rise causing the only solution of economic migration.
What their plan and why they are opting for foreign countries
Hundred of Thousands of applicants among them are Bachelors graduates who are going for Masters Degree but after interviewing some of them we got to know that everyone of them were using this degree plan as a process for settling in foreign countries permanently.
Let’s say if a person is going to Canada for Masters education, they will get limited hours work permit where they can work along with study. In that case they can work upto 10 hours a day along with extra shifts, with the minimum hourly wage of 15$ a person can earn up to 180$ in a day which way much higher than those who are working in high post in Pakistan.
With this pay process, they plan to cover their yearly education expense within 3 months while the rest of the year they plan to earn to support their families back home who sponsored their visa process. This is the go to plan for everyone who are going for masters degree.
Road to Permanent Residence and Citizenship
In most of the countries pakistani economic migration affected youth is applying they can get their PR within 3 or 4 years time.
After talking with number of people they said that if they get Job at decent company according to their skill set they can get Permanent residence status within 2 years.
This might be the biggest legal economic migration
Well it’s not like they are running towards border and leaving the country rather they are opting for legal ways which is the most shocking aspect of this modern economic migration. It is definitely not the cheaper one with almost average expense of 25,000$ for western countries while 6,000$ for developed middle east countries.
This shows the level of desperation right now as they are not even scared to spend this amount of money, many of them are going with no guarantee of job but still they believe that anything is better than nothing!
Is there any option for them ?
While country is going to worst economic crises with defeaning politics triggering Economic crises i.e mass exodus but there are many people on Pakistani twitter insisting on staying in country and stopping this economic crises that will eventually make country stripped off it’s most educated class.
There are many people who still believe that they should survive 1 or 2 year as economic migration is not the permanent solution to problems rather abandoning the country when it mattered the most to fight.
As many of the users on social media are fighting a case for revolution in economy, decreasing unnecessary millitary overspending, taxing the rich and developing the rotten system of country. There are many corporate companies are urging youth to stay hopeful and wait for better things to come. Pakistan’s most popular leader Imran khan also urged the youth to stay here and fight alongside with him, also he was sad on current hopelessness of youth which is going for economic migration.
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