It is largely in the private sector. It is motivated by profits rather than by either government policy or goodwill. It is, for the most part, unregulated. Those providing the product, mainly academic institutions and other educational providers in English-speaking countries, are to a considerable extent motivated by a need to export in order to make up budget shortfalls at home. There are a variety of educational products being sold.
Foreign study remains a big business.
The flows are largely from Asia to the West. Marketing is increasingly sophisticated, and despite the economic crisis in Asia, numbers continue to grow. Between 1996 and 1998, for example, the number of students going from Korea to the United States increased by 15.5 percent, from India by 10.4 percent, and from China by 10.5 percent. Japan, still the largest sending country to the United States, increased by just 1.7 percent, and Hong Kong declined by 11.7 percent. The United States hosts 481,000 overseas students, the large majority of whom pay all of their expenses.