Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Professional Mexicans continue seeking employment in the United States, raising the specter of a brain drain south of the border. In an interview with the Tijuana daily Frontera, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Consulate in the border city revealed that thousands of Baja California residents were granted professional work visas to work legally in the U.S. in recent years. According to Lorena Blanco, media coordinator for the U.S. Consulate, 4,054 work visas were granted by her office in Tijuana from October 2002 to the first few months of this year. The approval rate for professional work visa applications was about 90 percent.

Three categories of professional visas were granted by consular officials: the H-1B, TN and L1 class permits. Blanco said the first two visa categories
are set aside for professionals, technicians and specialists, while the LI class visa is reserved for employees of Mexican firms with U.S. branches who stand to gain a promotion from their current job if they are transferred north of the border. The TN visa is allowed under the North American Free Trade
Agreement.

Dr. Alfredo Hualde Alfaro, director of the department of social studies at the Colegio de la Frontera Norte, contended that the departure of professionals poses a problem for the regional economy. Dr. Hualde said that professional emigration undercuts public investments in education, which are not recuperated when trained professionals leave the country. For his part, Alejandro Mendez Manuel-Gomez, sub-director of the Ministry of Economy, says it is desirable for professionals to remain in Baja California.

Besides the traditional demand for blue-collar Mexican labor, interest in white-collar Mexican workers is growing north of the border. States like New Mexico are contracting teachers, and Mexican nurses are increasingly viewed as
one solution to an expanding nurse shortage in the U.S.