Migration and Emigration in Canada until 2003

This research discusses the relationship between the migration of skilled professional and managerial workers from Canada to the United States, the so-called “brain drain”, and seeks to determine if and how the Canada–U.S. Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) may have affected bilateral flows of permanent and non-permanent immigrants between the two countries.

Classical economic theory suggests that trade and factor movements are substitutes, so that freer trade between Canada and the United States could be expected to reduce incentives for bilateral migration. On the other hand, the labor demands of multinational corporations in the emerging global marketplace require a greater degree of worker mobility than has heretofore existed. The research reviews available historic and longitudinal evidence related to political, social and economic effects of the FTA and the NAFTA.