Because technical innovation is the engine of growth, nations are eager to attract and retain skilled migrants. This paper uses survey data to explore the intention to return among a highly skilled migrant population: Taiwan‐born household heads in the US. The inquiry is guided by expectations drawn from neo‐classical economics (NE) and the New Economics of Labour Migration (NELM). Multivariate analysis firsts predicts the intention to return, then distinguishes among motives. The results of the first analysis yield some findings consonant with NE and others consonant with NELM, but the results of the second indicate that only respondents motivated by a desire to invest fit the pattern articulated by NELM. Most of the remainder fit the pattern described by NE. Because potential investors comprise just 8.6% of the sample, the paper concludes that NE does a better job predicting the expectations of Taiwanese household heads than does NELM. Yet, most return migration occurs within 5 years of arrival, while the present sample represents all Taiwanese households, regardless of time in the US. Thus, the sample underrepresents migrants with the greatest propensity to return. Consequently, the findings of this research generalise only to relatively settled Taiwanese‐Americans. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.