UAE Golden Visa Brings Stability to Everyday Workers
Long-term residency now reaches nurses, teachers and engineers, not just investors
For the hundreds of thousands of foreign nurses, teachers, engineers and families whose daily lives in the United Arab Emirates depend on their residency status, a small plastic document can hold enormous civic weight. Losing a job once meant losing the right to stay in the country, and with it, the ability to raise a family there. That everyday anxiety is what the UAE set out to address when it widened its ten-year golden visa program to a much broader group of residents, extending long-term stability to people who carry the nation on their shoulders rather than necessarily on their balance sheets.
Most people associate golden visas, which are offered by roughly 100 countries according to the market’s own estimates, including Portugal, Australia, Canada, Greece and, recently, the United States with its 2025 “gold card,” with wealthy buyers of residence. The standard bargain was simple: residency in exchange for money. Wealthy foreigners put hundreds of thousands of dollars into real estate or businesses, and governments gave them a foothold abroad.
The UAE stretched that model further. When it launched its golden visa in 2019, the government offered ten-year residency to people who could invest at least $545,000 in property, as well as to researchers, teachers and specialized talent. It expanded again in 2020 and 2022 to include doctors, nurses, engineers, tech workers and e-sports gamers. According to Kristin Surak, a professor of political sociology at the London School of Economics and author of The Golden Passport: Global Mobility for Millionaires, the country took a status normally associated with the rich and powerful and turned it into an umbrella program for both capital and talent, blending labor and industrial policies.
For a government overseeing a population in which expats make up 90% of the total, the shift also answered a structural question of public administration. Before the program, foreigners relied on two-year, employment-linked visas, which created uncertainty in building an economic base that could support a welfare system and basic state infrastructure, Surak said. By issuing ten-year residency directly to the person rather than the employer, the state gave residents room to put down roots without tying their family’s stability to a single job.
Dubai has used that tool deliberately to strengthen sectors the public relies on. The city granted more than 1,400 golden visas to nurses and midwives, and over 223 to educators from private schools, universities and early childhood centers. It has also made long-term residency part of a push to grow its gaming industry by 2033, opening applications to e-sports professionals with the goal of creating 30,000 gaming jobs and adding about $1 billion to GDP in a city now home to more than 350 gaming companies. “It’s not a traditional golden visa,” Surak told Fortune. “Gold sounds cooler. You want a lead scientist? You call [the visa] gold.”
Residents themselves feel the difference. Swanand Pagnis, co-founder of enterprise AI engineering firm Superlinear Insights, moved to the UAE in 2022 on an employer-sponsored visa before securing a golden visa in 2023. With a wife and daughter, the prospect that losing his job could also cost his family their home weighed on him. “When you’re in a foreign country, one of the levers a company has on you is the visa, and there’s always a little bit of this tension where if you lose your job, you have to leave the country, leave everything behind,” he told Fortune. “The golden visa allows me to sponsor my family on my own.”
The program’s resilience has been tested by geopolitics. After Iran launched thousands of missiles and drones at the UAE during its war with the U.S., striking five-star hotels and Dubai’s airport, official figures cited by The National showed Dubai lost 61,000 residents in March, a 1.3% drop that brought the population to 4.65 million. The population rebounded to 4.74 million by the end of June and has added 157,000 residents so far this year, even though the UAE revoked visas or residency permits for some Iranian expats during the conflict.
Meanwhile, duty-bearers in government moved to protect residents caught in the disruption. On March 15, authorities said they helped 500 golden visa holders and residents return after airspace closures and flight disruptions stranded them abroad. Immigration officials also let stranded residents whose permits had expired return without applying for a new entry visa and waived overstay fines. At the end of March, Dubai approved a roughly $272 million relief package including faster issuance and renewal of residency permits, which the government said would make it “easier for talent to live and work in Dubai.” The UAE has not publicly changed the golden visa’s eligibility rules since the war.
Advisers to skilled workers and investors notice the strain but not a collapse. “We have certainly seen a slowdown in enquiries and applications for UAE residence in recent months, with geopolitical uncertainty influencing sentiment,” Dominic Volek, who advises wealthy families on residence and citizenship planning at Henley & Partners, told Fortune. “We see this as a moderation in demand rather than a fundamental shift in the UAE’s appeal.” Vladlena Baranova, head of legal at consulting firm Immigrant Invest, said clients choose the UAE over competing programs for safety, lifestyle and business reasons, noting that her firm’s Gulf-region clients value Dubai’s high scores on perceptions of public safety and quality of life, while its European ones seek the tax environment and real estate opportunities. The country does not levy income taxes, though some business activity is subject to a corporate tax.
For Pagnis, the decision to stay came down to his daughter’s schooling. Iran’s attacks made his daughter’s school announce an early term break, and his family temporarily relocated to India before returning when flights to the UAE resumed and were declared safe. “We were in the middle of the school year and did not want to change in haste,” he said. Dubai’s media and residency authorities and the UAE’s federal immigration authority did not respond to Fortune’s multiple requests for comment; more detail on the program can be found at https://fortune.com/2026/10/18/uae-dubai-golden-visa-nurses-teachers-expats-iran-war/.
Whether the golden visa can keep holding families steady through further regional turbulence is the question now facing the residents who have built their lives around it.
Q&A
Who can qualify for the UAE golden visa beyond wealthy investors?
Since its 2019 launch and expansions in 2020 and 2022, the program covers people investing at least $545,000 in property, plus researchers, teachers, doctors, nurses, engineers, tech workers, specialized talent and e-sports gamers.
How did the UAE government support residents during the Iran conflict?
On March 15 authorities helped 500 golden visa holders and residents return after airspace closures stranded them abroad, let residents with expired permits return without a new entry visa, waived overstay fines, and Dubai approved a roughly $272 million relief package including faster residency permit issuance and renewal.
How did the war affect Dubai's population?
Dubai lost 61,000 residents in March, a 1.3% drop to 4.65 million, after Iranian missiles and drones struck hotels and the airport. The population rebounded to 4.74 million by the end of June and has added 157,000 residents this year, despite some Iranian expats having visas revoked.
What difference does the golden visa make for ordinary residents?
It decouples residency from employment, so losing a job no longer means leaving the country. Resident Swanand Pagnis said it let him sponsor his family on his own, removing the fear that a job loss would cost his wife and daughter their home.