After each global economic downturn or financial crisis, the Lebanese engage in a time-honored head count to see who has lost his or her place in their host country and who has not. However, ‘head counts’ by Lebanese embassies in Gulf capitals showed that the expected reverse exodus of Lebanese expatriates during the financial crash of 2008 was more a trickle than a flood. “Lebanese in the United Arab Emirates have been the least affected among the Arab and foreign communities because they are not primarily employees, but rather business owners,” stated a 2009 study from the University of Poitiers in France, citing reports from the Lebanese foreign ministry. Another foreign ministry report stated that “the crisis has not increased the percentage of Lebanese permanently leaving Kuwait,” and concluded more generally that “the scare of massive lay-offs and returns that swept Lebanon and its expatriates in the Gulf did not
