Nummus, Manus and Returnee Scientist Productivity: Evidence from China’s Young Thousand Talents Program
Dr. Yanbo Wang
Assistant Professor in Strategy and Policy
NUS Business School
Scientists play a central role in a knowledge-based economy. To reverse the “brain drain” trend, many countries have set up policy programs to attract skilled emigrants to return. However, the effectiveness of these programs has been mixed, partly due to policy heterogeneity. This study investigates one of the most prominent programs – China’s Young Thousand Talents Plan – and identifies every member of the first four cohorts of the program and matches them with similarly educated Chinese scientists working overseas, based on the same academic discipline and same pre-“treatment” trend in scientific knowledge production. Difference in differences estimation provides evidence that recruits of the young talent program are associated with a large boost in knowledge productivity, an effect that varies across institutional types (i.e. research universities versus Chinese Academy of Sciences), time and academic disciplines. The performance boosting effect can be completely explained by talent program funding and research team size, suggesting that its success can be replicated in other regions of the world.
