Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

China’s scientific enterprise is advancing rapidly: peer-reviewed STEM publications from China quadrupled between 2000 and 2016, now surpassing the US. While historically the vast majority of Chinese scientists who received US PhDs remained here after their studies, their stay rate has fallen, partially due to per-country limits on permanent visas. Here, we use NSF’s Survey of Doctorate Recipients to compare the jobs and salaries of Chinese who return home to those who stay. Prior work has suggested that STEM PhD graduates who remain in the US are the most able. However, the Chinese PhDs who remain are not predominantly from the highest tiers of US universities, nor originally from the best Chinese undergraduate universities. Chinese staying in the US v. those returning home hold different jobs. 2/3^rds of those in China but only 1/3^rd of those in the US work in academia. Basic research is the primary focus of 38% of those who return to China, but of only 19% of US-stayers. Those in China are 14 percentage points more likely to be working in jobs closely related to their fields. Those in China are 3 times as likely to be managers (16% v. 5%). In contrast, US-stayers are 6 times as likely to do computer programming, design or development (37% v. 5%) and more than twice as likely to be in the private sector. US salaries are much higher. Average dollar salaries of STEM PhDs in China are only 1/3 of salaries in the US (controlling for personal characteristics). However, this rises to 70% of US salaries after adjusting for purchasing power (PPP). And this percentage is increasing over time. These facts point to increasingly attractive intellectual and career opportunities in China v. a decreasing salary advantage in the US, trends that show no signs of abating.