Portugal: Combatting the brain drain

DW (English)

Portugal is losing its well-educated young people, who now often prefer to move abroad to work. Now the government is trying to counteract this by waiving their taxes. Will it work?

Transcript

00:00What a view! Hundreds of tourists in Lisbon get to enjoy it every day.

00:06The city may be beautiful, but it's no longer affordable for many Portuguese.

00:10We meet Rita Branco in front of Portugal's biggest hospital.

00:14She's handing out flyers from her union and trying to find fellow activists to fight to improve things.

00:21The cost of living is rising, but wages aren't keeping up.

00:28A few hundred kilometers further north, things look a bit brighter.

00:33Carolina Azevedo and her mother are making lunch.

00:37The young woman has recently finished her studies and is about to start working.

00:42She studied medicine in Coimbra, but now…

00:47The basic salary for the first year, starting in January, is 1700 euros gross a month.

00:54I'll work in Portugal for a year, so that I can save money and learn German.

01:02As for housing, in the big cities you pay around 800 or 900 euros.

01:09One year of work there and then she's off.

01:12Because she's not just disappointed with her income.

01:16Carolina interned abroad during her studies and has seen how other countries work.

01:21She now wants to learn German so that she can apply for a job in Switzerland.

01:28My brother works there and I get first-hand information.

01:32That reassures me and makes it clear that I'm not chasing an illusion.

01:38Carolina's plans are a bitter blow for her family.

01:42Two of the three children will soon be working abroad.

01:47We've tried to give them the opportunity to be closer to us, but that's impossible in this country.

01:53They're trying to manage their lives as best they can.

01:58The country's problems are written on political billboards.

02:01Too few emergency rooms, housing shortages and of course the brain drain.

02:06The Portuguese government is aware that too many young people are leaving the country

02:11and that's why it wants to waive their taxes.

02:15Over the past decade we've been struggling with a fundamental demographic problem.

02:20And now we have a problem with competitively low productivity and low wages

02:25compared to the countries of our geographic regions to Portugal.

02:28We believe this initiative could impact 350 to 400 thousand young people.

02:34Economist José Alberto Ferreira is one of the target audience.

02:38He also works in the Italian city of Florence.

02:41But would he come back for lower taxes? No way!

02:44It's not just about salaries, it's also because job and career opportunities in Portugal

02:49are fewer and of lower quality than in other places that attract talent.

02:55Yet Lisbon is considered a start-up mecca.

02:58International projects such as the biotech company Micro Harvest

03:02have a branch on the Tagus River as well as in the German city of Hamburg.

03:08With our presence in Lisbon we want to show that it's possible to work here too.

03:16That it's possible to work in innovation and that there are opportunities.

03:23Portugal lacks large and medium sized companies

03:26and the tax burden has increased so much that even the motivated entrepreneur

03:31admits that it's difficult over the long haul.

03:34Portugal trains its young people well but fails to provide housing even though it's available.

03:41Thousands of apartments and buildings like this one are said to be vacant across the country.

03:46All the more reason to emigrate.

03:51Thiago, 27, works for a management consultancy.

03:55We meet him in a trendy part of Lisbon.

03:57But that makes little impression on him.

04:00He wants to move to Denmark in the coming months.

04:03I've noticed that there's a very clear and noticeable balance

04:08between work and family there.

04:13I'm not just talking about salaries.

04:15I'm talking about the likeness.

04:17I'm talking about the quality of public services, even public transport for example.

04:24It's about career prospects and work-life balance.

04:27That's exactly what four Portuguese engineers confirm in the video call.

04:32They work in Sweden and are happy there.

04:39That was certainly one of the most important factors in us moving here.

04:42That the balance between professional and private life is really good.

04:46Something that we really appreciate.

04:48And that's very different from Portugal.

04:55Portugal attracts millions of tourists but alienates its own young people.

04:59And tax cuts alone are not enough.

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