It should not come as a surprise that people in Pakistan, increasingly want to work abroad. The year gone by saw a little over 872,000 workers (annualized on 11 months of actual data) registering for employment abroad. This is nearly 5 percent higher from a year ago, and still not the highest yearly number for workers registering for employment abroad. The highest number of workers registering for employment abroad was recorded in 2015 at 0.95 million – 2023 comes as the second highest.

It is the category composition within the dataset that is most striking. The outgoing year saw more doctors, engineers, accountants, and managers registering for employment abroad – than ever before. Four of the five occupation categories falling in the highly qualified or highly skilled categories recorded the highest ever yearly number – which surely indicates there is a method to the madness. It has long been argued that the employment data as reported by the Bureau of Emigration and Overseas Employment is more indicative of the demand side, and not necessarily the supply side. Willingness to work abroad may be significantly higher than those who end up working abroad – for a variety of reasons, from market demand to financial and social constraints for aspirants.

The increase in a few categories is astonishing, such as that in the “managers” category. Over 40,000 registrations in the category is not only more than double from a year ago (the then highest) – it is more than the cumulative number for 43 years between 1971 and 2014. This represents an incredible 29 percent of the overall workers’ registration under the category in over 50 years. Also, the first time a qualified or highly skilled occupation category made it to the top 10. The “Manager” category was the third most sought after – leaving behind the categories that have historically held the spots such as masons, electricians, and carpenters.

Under broad categorization – the categories at two extremes, highly qualified and unskilled - saw the highest readings. The highly skilled category also saw the highest number of workers registering abroad – more than double from a year ago, primarily due to the meteoric rise in the “managers” category.

In terms of employment destinations, there has been a visible shift in the last two years, with the UAE share coming down drastically, while Saudi Arabia now holds more than half of all annual registrations for the last two years. This could possibly be because of Saudi Arabia’s 2030 Vision which entails significant construction-related activities – and the trend should be expected to hold for the years to come.