Pakistan has one of the most capable youth in the world, yet why are they choosing to leave their homeland? Instead of looking forward to not even great but just opportunities and comfort, the youth chooses the life out of their comfort zones and the home where they’ve no discrimination for how they are born or the beliefs they follow yet they tend to learn new languages and skills and would be up for skilled migration; change their whole cultural or religious brought up but for what? Just to fit in? They would compromise on not being themselves so that they can live at ease and know that they are protected? For the basic necessity that their basic human rights are not breached? Pakistan has always been an enriched country, both agriculturally and culturally. We live in the country where there might be ethnic or religious diversity, but we were so united, that by the end of the day we stood firm against the all the problems. But now, the problem is not just better salaries but deeper failures in mindset at personal level and in government at state level. The youth doesn’t want to live under constant stress regardless of how capable or talented they are, because of the problems that are so at the core that one individual cannot fix it, so they find it easy to move abroad as an escape and do something for their own country at individual level which cannot be done by living in the same country. One of the main drivers of youth migration is lack of job opportunities. No matter how highly educated an individual is he would still struggle to make money in his field. According to the World Bank, Pakistan needs millions of investment in job market to cope up with the growing youth population. This issue then creates a situation where the degree loses its worth and education becomes less important because thousands of graduates, especially the male dominants, that they have to hustle anyways regardless of what degree they hold or how skillful they are. So if a country cannot provide a means to win bread and opportunities to work even to its literate citizens, migration becomes less of a choice and more of a necessity. Then some of the other drivers include, rising inflation, which becomes one of the main reasons of youth migration in most of the cases. Because of no job opportunities and inadequate salaries combined, it becomes really hard for the young professionals to maintain a decent lifestyle as compared to global standards. The cost of living in Pakistan has significantly increased in the past years, while the wages have remained relatively stagnant. This economic balance along with structural issues such as political instability, governance failure, inconsistent policies and uncertainty about the future while living in the same country, creates an environment where long-term planning becomes unpredictable and unreliable. Then there is nepotism. The absence of a strong merit-based system further pushes the eligible youth away from the country towards migration. When people would know that their capabilities and efforts wouldn’t be fairly recognized, they would be more likely to look for opportunities in the countries where their performance and merit would be assessed through meritocratic systems and evaluated objectively. These drivers collectively accelerates the erosion of Pakistan’s skilled workforce. This leads to the conclusion that the state must prioritize the creation of better employment opportunities, increase funding in education and strengthen economic stability and its institutions to in order to address the core issues of outmigration of youth. Otherwise the country would keep losing its skilled doctors, engineers and IT experts to the countries that would just exploit them for their utility over their development and recognition. By: Laiba Asim
