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UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

theguardian.com

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Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#101

Post by tankenmate »

misja111 wrote: post #86
codecurve wrote: post #25

I just finished an EU funded CompSci Masters degree in Wales, the poorest country in the UK and it's devastatingly sad to think that once the EU research funding stops, those opportunities will be gone forever for future students coming through the department. There aren't enough large tech companies in the area for there to be any sponsored degrees available, which probably means that when the funding finishes, the…

The UK is a net payer to the EU. For instance in 2015 alone, UK's net payment to the EU was about 8.5 billion pounds. So after the Brexit there will be more than enough money to continue the research funding. But as you mention already, it is another question if the government will be wanting to pay it. But is this really such a bad thing? The difference will that instead of the EU, the UK itself will decide which of…

That whole £8.5b won't be retained by the UK though if it's economy continues to struggle with trade issues between itself and its largest trading partner, the EU.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#103

Post by sievebrain »

junto wrote: post #48
wrong_variable wrote: post #19

Large Multinationals like Unilever, even for incremental decisions - like changing the type of light bulb, takes years to execute. This is why a large change in their business is so difficult and you need a very good CEO ( ask Marissa Mayer ) The decision UK made to leave the EU is akin for Unilever to switch from selling shampoos to selling software - and we are not talking about a multinational with 100,000 employe…

> Not only will the EU trade treaty need to be renegotiated, but so does the 50 other trade treaty with other nations - those treaties took a lot of time and over 600+ negotiators to write, the UK only have 30 negotiators and about 2 years. The UK hasn't done their own trade negotiations for over 30 years. The EU has. They haven't got the right people with the right experience to do this (yet). They need to hire the…

The EU has done an extremely bad job of signing trade deals. Much smaller countries have managed to do a much better job. I wouldn't look at the EU and say "we need the same setup" because the EU deliberately makes it hard for itself to sign deals by insisting that they try to satisfy 28 different countries simultaneously, who don't use the same language and which all have their own random domestic priorities to handle.

I've actually read trade deals. The idea that there's only a handful of people in the world who can negotiate these things is ridiculous.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#104

Post by pjc50 »

teekert wrote: post #91
peteretep wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you specify some of the "EU regulations" that we should be getting out from under?

Well, for example all the bad stuff TTIP will bring the rest of Europe? Everybody here is pissed about TTIP. Now the Brits vote to get into a position to do something about such undemocratic bs and suddenly they are the bad guys? I see the pro-EU marketing campaign in which all the smart, rich and famous people that you should want to be like, say pro EU things, is working well. Even among the intellectual HN crowd.…

People keep talking about how the UK will be able to negotiate its own market access deals after brexit. What that means in practice is that if TTIP goes ahead it will be the only route to US trade deals.

Also TTIP is the kind of think I can see a Conservative government signing up to immediately. The UK is far more "free market" than the rest of Europe.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#105

Post by nicktelford »

misja111 wrote: post #86
codecurve wrote: post #25

I just finished an EU funded CompSci Masters degree in Wales, the poorest country in the UK and it's devastatingly sad to think that once the EU research funding stops, those opportunities will be gone forever for future students coming through the department. There aren't enough large tech companies in the area for there to be any sponsored degrees available, which probably means that when the funding finishes, the…

The UK is a net payer to the EU. For instance in 2015 alone, UK's net payment to the EU was about 8.5 billion pounds. So after the Brexit there will be more than enough money to continue the research funding. But as you mention already, it is another question if the government will be wanting to pay it. But is this really such a bad thing? The difference will that instead of the EU, the UK itself will decide which of…

That's assuming tax revenue remains the same, which all economists agree will not be the case.

Whether or not Brexit will boost public finances is entirely down to how much of an impact it'll have on the UK economy. No one knows what the impact will be, but almost everyone agrees that it will be negative... though no one agrees to what extent.

So there's really two questions here: a) just how much more/less public money will be available? and, b) if there is more, how much of it will go to research?

No one knows the answers to either question, not even the government.

edit: a very quick back-of-envelope calculation based on the forecast tax receipts for 2014-2015 of 648.1bn[1]: 8.5bn makes up a whopping 1.31% of tax receipts. Unless I'm mistaken, tax receipts correlate strongly with the strength of the economy, so any more than a ~1.3% decline in the economy as a consequence of Brexit, would consume the "savings".

[1]: http://www.ifs.org.uk/bns/bn09.pdf

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#106

Post by DasIch »

junto wrote: post #48
wrong_variable wrote: post #19

Large Multinationals like Unilever, even for incremental decisions - like changing the type of light bulb, takes years to execute. This is why a large change in their business is so difficult and you need a very good CEO ( ask Marissa Mayer ) The decision UK made to leave the EU is akin for Unilever to switch from selling shampoos to selling software - and we are not talking about a multinational with 100,000 employe…

> Not only will the EU trade treaty need to be renegotiated, but so does the 50 other trade treaty with other nations - those treaties took a lot of time and over 600+ negotiators to write, the UK only have 30 negotiators and about 2 years. The UK hasn't done their own trade negotiations for over 30 years. The EU has. They haven't got the right people with the right experience to do this (yet). They need to hire the…

Even if the UK had the people to start trade negotiations right this second, they're not allowed to until they leave the EU and it takes years to negotiate such an agreement.

It would take decades for the UK to catch up to the EU on trade agreements again, if they ever do.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#107

Post by scott_s »

sievebrain wrote: post #52
mpweiher wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wut? There are certain benefits you get by being a member of this club. I am leaving your club. Then you no longer get the benefits that members of the club get. YOU ARE UNFAIRLY PUNISHING ME!!!!

It makes no sense for relations between countries to be structured as an exclusive "club". This just retards progress and leads to stagnation when it becomes impossible to get all the members of the "club" to agree.

It's been an organizing practice for states for a long time. On the loose end, you have treaty organizations, and on the strict end, you have states mutually agreeing to cede power to a federal authority. The EU was somewhere in the middle.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#108

Post by diego_moita »

2skep wrote: post #47
ckinnan wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU's retarding democracy and human progress; European growth is non-existent, the Euro is failing, and fiscal and banking mismanagement in Greece/Italy/Spain/Portugual are destroying German and British wealth. Britain has almost all of the world-class research universities in the European Union and they will thrive outside the EU. Edit with sources: EU real per capita GDP is flat after 10 years: http://ec.europa.…

As a result of majority voters voting in favour of Brexit and to recover the democratic deficit and negotiate UK's exit from the EU a new PM has been appointed who did not support Leave. She was selected by Westminster which is largely supportive of Remain It would be very hard not to conclude that it is actually Westminster that is retarding democracy.

> She was selected

Or, maybe, the only thing Brexiters know how to do with problems and responsibilities is to "exit"/run away from them? (e.g.: Johnson, Farage, Leadsom,...)

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#109

Post by sievebrain »

djaychela wrote: post #99
misja111 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK is a net payer to the EU. For instance in 2015 alone, UK's net payment to the EU was about 8.5 billion pounds. So after the Brexit there will be more than enough money to continue the research funding. But as you mention already, it is another question if the government will be wanting to pay it. But is this really such a bad thing? The difference will that instead of the EU, the UK itself will decide which of…

"More than enough money" (and certainly the figures I've seen people bandying about) assumes that the cost of accessing the EU market (which I think we will have to pay) would be zero. I think it will be a significant proportion of the amount we were paying (net) to the EU, and in addition there will be other costs which people are just starting to cotton onto as well. The main thing is that at the moment, we really…

WTO max tariffs (worst case scenario) are 4%. But the currency has weaked by about 8%. So even if max tariffs are applied tomorrow, UK goods are still cheaper to buy in the EU than before!

In practice, if the EU doesn't strike a deal with the UK (which it won't) then I think it will suffer more exits. Because the EU has spent years trying to sign free trade deals with America, Canada and other places. If it turns around and says "we will give those countries tariff-free access to our markets but not the UK" this will send a powerful message to all EU citizens that this is not an organisation with their best interests at heart.

Re: UK scientists dropped from EU projects because of post-Brexit funding fears

#110

Post by barrkel »

sievebrain wrote: post #98
ck425 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't deny there will be less funding, given the amount of funding we receive from the EU. Though hopefully the new PM will prioritise investment in research and hopefully given the strong technology sector in the UK CompSci will get a reasonable share of it. But that's still to be seen and given May's attitude toward technology experts and level of knowledge during the discussions around the Snoopers Charter I'm…

The EU doesn't "fund" anything, the UK funds the EU by paying in more than it gets back out. It's literally the UK's own money being recycled through Brussels, except with extra rules and exchange rate risks thrown in. Whether or not research funding is cut is an entirely open question right now. Maybe it will be: the EU has effectively been overriding the austerity policies everyone else in the economy has had to de…

We all know this. The UK has been funding a bureaucracy in the EU that in turn funds projects in impoverished areas of the UK (amongst others). It will need to replace that bureaucracy; the transaction and planning costs on everything on the drawing board to in progress right now, will not be cheap, quite apart from the direct funding costs. The replacement bureaucracy probably won't be cheaper either, since it will have less efficiencies of scale and less institutional experience.

In short, "nobody can know what will happen" is expensive; it directly implies that the immediate short term will be costly.

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