T&T has lost more than 70 per cent of its tertiary level educated labour force through emigration to developed countries, according to an Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) report released Tuesday.
The report looks at events up to 2012.
The T&T labour force, according to statistics from the Central Statistical Office is made up of 635,100 persons as at the first quarter of 2013.
The report entitled, Is there a Caribbean Sclerosis? Stagnating Economic Growth in the Caribbean, said 79 per cent of the labour force in T&T who received tertiary level education up to 2011 migrated to member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
"The OECD has been called a think tank, monitoring agency, rich man's club and unacademic university. Whatever you want to call it, the OECD has a lot of power. Over the years, it has dealt with a range of issues, including raising the standard of living in member countries, contributing to the expansion of world trade and promoting economic stability," according to Investopedia. The term OECD countries is often used loosely in economics as a euphemism for developed countries.
"Euro sclerosis" was a term coined in the 1970s to describe stagnant integration, high unemployment, and slow job creation in Europe relative to the United States, authors of the report explained. Since then, the term has been used more generally to refer to overall economic stagnation, they said.
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