We have had a bit of a debate in the pages of The National over the past few days about the future of expatriates in the developing world.

Those of us who are, in fact, expats have paid close attention to the discussion, and I will refer to it in today’s post, as well as tomorrow’s.

In this first think piece, written by Gavin du Venage for The National’s weekly Personal Finance section, the author suggests that we expats who went out into the world to take advantage of well-paying opportunities in our chosen fields … “belong to a fortunate generation” one that “soon enough, will be extinct.”

Some thoughts:

The author suggests that expats, many of them from First World economies that have stalled or crashed over the past four years (yes, I have my hand up) have been fortunate to find that large parts of the world are expanding more quickly than their ability to find skilled workers to staff all of their projects

Certainly, the UAE would be high on that list. As would Qatar and Bahrain, here in the Gulf, and Saudi Arabia to a lesser extent. But countries in Africa and across the Indian Ocean, especially those with commodity-based economies, also are often looking for foreign workers to come in and run their operations or lend expertise to them.

These jobs run from building skyscrapers to staffing oil rigs to setting up telecoms to putting out English-language newspapers.

The author also takes a detour to beat down suggestions that expats are simply people who failed at home. “The average expat does not move halfway across the globe in search of a better tan,” he wrote. “It takes a certain kind of moxie to trust your financial fate to a distant country, where the laws are different and the safety net of friends and family does not exist.”

He also notes that statistics seem to indicate that expats are living more comfortably and saving more money than those who stayed home during the current economic downturn. Financial incentive has always been the prime force for leaving your country of origin for any length of time. (You could have asked the millions who streamed through Ellis Island a century ago.)

He also notes that despite what friends and relatives back home might think, many countries overseas are safer, on a daily basis. The UAE, for instance, has remarkably low levels of crime, and some parents willingly take children overseas with them, figuring they will grow up in a more stable environment. (And, we should add, with a much broader world view.)

However, he sees all of this coming to an end, in the not-too-distant future, because all countries hosting large numbers of expats in vital jobs quickly become uncomfortable with the idea of foreigners running many aspects of their economy, and will be keen to replace us expats as soon as possible.

For instance, here in the UAE, a government program known as “Emiratization” is in full swing, and it calls for nearly all management or high-skill jobs to be filled with a citizen, if one can be found with the proper qualifications. Dubai and Abu Dhabi will, perhaps, have far fewer Brits and Yanks and Germans and French hanging around, 10 years from now.

I’m not sure I agree with the author that expats will be cycled out in the short term. Not across the board.

Many developing countries have weak educational infrastructure, and they will need years, or decades, to produce their own experts across a range of endeavors.

But I concede that it has occurred to me — many times — that those of us who are earning a comfortable living abroad when the options at home were grim, often think about how fortunate we were that these opportunities existed.

Can it go on forever? Perhaps not. Maybe we are just members of “a fortunate generation.”

But it seems to me that anyone with modern skills based on higher education or deep experience, will always be able to find a place outside their country of origin — if they are willing to look, and then ready to make the jump.