For 74% of Argentinian students, the country is a worse place to live now than 5 years ago

The excellence of Argentine universities and the professionals who have graduated from them has always been a highlight across the world. In a country with a wide range of free public and secondary careers, talking about the quality of education doesn’t seem like an easy task. However, we also know that many of those who study at universities in the country then seek to develop professionally abroad.

According to a recent survey of 16,839 university students aged 18 to 21 from 21 countries, only 16% of Argentinian university students think the country is a good place to live. Yes Three-quarters of Argentine students (74%) responded that the country is a country where living is worse than five years ago, a higher percentage than in the rest of the countries studied.

The survey of the lives, hopes and fears of university students around the world in the context of the pandemic also showed that only 8% gave an optimistic view about the future and that 76% said they had struggled to meet their expenses in the past year, more than in any other country surveyed.

Data from the Global Student Survey conducted by the consulting firm Yonder (with offices in London, New York and Hong Kong) included 500 students from Argentina and coincided with another study by Universidad Argentina de la Empresa (UADE) in 2019 among residents of the city of Buenos Aires and GBA, with an average age of 32 years.

At this moment, more than half (55%) of those consulted had considered the possibility of emigrating from the country and 20% had considered it but, for some reason, did not consider it viable. In other words, 75% had evaluated the alternative of leaving, but abroad but for family reasons, not straying from their network of friends and in some cases faced with the uncertainty of a culture change, most of them didn’t realize your plan.

Nicolás Rotelli is coordinator of the Institute of Social Sciences and Project Disciplines of UADE and in consultation with Infobae In your opinion, to what is due the pessimism of Argentine university students towards the country, he stressed that – as they had obtained in the said survey – “31% consider going abroad due to recurring economic crises, secondly (26%) in search of better professional development possibilities, then 19% were expelled from the national territory by insecurity, and in the same percentage, with a high tax of 11% political pressure and motivation ”.

“Most young people have thought about it or still think about it and the main driver is the improvement of their quality of life in general terms”, I consider.

“The pessimism of young people towards the country seems to reflect some of the “physical” effects that manifest the presence of the virus that changed the world. You could say that “the taste and flavor of life is lost”. The impact of the pandemic on the multiplication of depressive images, feelings of loneliness and vital decline among the youngest is a global phenomenon ”. In the opinion of Julio Durand, Academic Secretary of Austral University (AU) and professor of the AU School of Education, “In Argentina, ingredients are added to a cocktail that seems quite toxic: there is disbelief among the authorities, who have relegated education time and time again.. At the same time, casinos, cinemas, but not universities, are opening. Thousands of young people cannot graduate, which accentuates the gap between those who can attend institutions with the capacity to respond and those who are left at the mercy of inoperations, political conflicts, trade union conflicts ”.

And after having considered that “they do not miss the difficult behaviors of the minimum sanitary collections which one could observe in the tourist places: the young people do not believe those who say to solve their problems”, he underlined. “Among university students, knowing that they obtain a higher preparation, the temptation to emigrate to more developed countries is spreading, but also to others where at least it is possible to dream of saving, of progressing and of ‘have a perspective for the future, which Argentina unfortunately does not do. propose for several decades ”.

The most popular destination for young Argentines to emigrate is Spain, followed by the United States and Italy and, to a lesser extent, Australia, Canada and Uruguay.

Regarding the paradox that national universities and their graduates have such a good reputation abroad and Argentinian professionals decide to practice outside the country, Rotelli analyzed that “It is precisely not among the motivations of young people to go to study abroad, it is work that worries them”. “The country’s universities continue to be highly regarded, young people don’t think about going to study abroad; the proposal is at odds with what the Argentine labor market offers “, Held.

In the Latin American countries studied – Brazil, Argentina and Mexico – more students thought their country was a worse place to live compared to five years ago than students who thought it was a better place to live. In contrast, in most Asian countries except South Korea, more students thought their country was a better place to live compared to five years ago than students who thought it was a better place to live. was a worse place to live.

The total of the countries included in the search are Germany, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, India, Indonesia, Italy and Japan. , Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States and Russia. Sample sizes ranged from 500 to 1,007 in each country.

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