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Elite Underproduction

troynikov.io

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Re: Elite Underproduction

#171

Post by RNCTX »

amusedcyclist wrote: post #144
RNCTX wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If that was the case then FAANG wouldn't be filled with Asians and engineers from ex-Soviet countries. The makeup of high paying tech companies does not represent in any way the makeup of the American population. I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism. In a land where money buys everything, you think culture is the reason why a thing exists or doesn't exist? I think you're…

H1B's in Big tech are about as far from indentured servants as you can imagine, they're in high demand and switch jobs for better pay constantly. American kids with access to generational wealth aren't as interested in difficult technical subjects.

> H1B's in Big tech are about as far from indentured servants as you can imagine

False.

> they're in high demand and switch jobs for better pay constantly.

And each time they do so, their new employer has to go through the entire process of getting them a new H1 visa. When your right to be in a place is dependent upon your labor to a specific contracted employer, you are an indentured servant.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#172

Post by rsj_hn »

RNCTX wrote: post #64
b9a2cab5 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that was the case then FAANG wouldn't be filled with Asians and engineers from ex-Soviet countries. The makeup of high paying tech companies does not represent in any way the makeup of the American population. I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism. If you look at top public school undergrad programs that don't practice affirmative action (UC's, UW) the programs are almost…

> If that was the case then FAANG wouldn't be filled with Asians and engineers from ex-Soviet countries. The makeup of high paying tech companies does not represent in any way the makeup of the American population. I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism. In a land where money buys everything, you think culture is the reason why a thing exists or doesn't exist? I think you're…

> I posit the reason this is the case is American culture and anti-intellectualism.

Or perhaps awful schools

Re: Elite Underproduction

#173

Post by kcb »

xyzelement wrote: post #121
civilized wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a concern, but a strong dollar isn't all roses and sunshine either. For one thing, it makes it hard for the American economy to compete in anything but the highest-margin industries. I'm not convinced that the rise of China will be so bad. Boomers and neocons want us to think so, but their "arguments" are mostly just paranoia and sentimentality.

> I'm not convinced that the rise of China will be so bad. Boomers and neocons want us to think so You're not convinced that going from "living in the most economically dominant and militarily powerful country in the world" to "not" is going to somehow not be a painful experience? You can use the "I am not convinced" line for anything. "I am not convinced that being homeless is worse than living in a nice house" but.…

Aren't you implying that every country besides the US is currently having a painful experience?

Re: Elite Underproduction

#174

Post by Ericson2314 »

This is no antidote to Malthusianism. Better to read https://delong.typepad.com/kalecki43.pdf.

Stasis and zero-sum is not as "natural" a situation as is often assumed, giving society's current capabilities. Better to realize while there is no elite conspiracy, the powers that be don't deep down want the the all-out growth they came too, because it is too destabilizing and equalizing. In particular, tight labor markets level the playing field between employer and employee.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#175

Post by jollybean »

zozbot234 wrote: post #165
jollybean wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" there just isn't the springboard from academic research to commercialization" I worked in tech transfer for a bit. There isn't such a thing as 'translation of science' because knowledge itself is pretty useless, even applied research is. Products - which hopefully embody some of those things - are what people buy and the things that go into making good products are a bit orthogonal to classical R&D approach. Thinki…

Translational research is its own subfield in biotech too. And it's plausibly one key place where a lot of low-hanging fruit might still be hidden, both in biotech and in the harder sciences. In general, it would be nice if academia did its part as an alternate, fully formalized source of what's usually left to tacit "folk" know-how in all sorts of industry-relevant pursuits.

True that, with the caveat that biotech has much longer development cycles, and often socialized markets, which make them an odd fit for scrappy entrepreneurs and VC.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#176

Post by Nitrolo »

bjornsing wrote: post #152

> Young people going into physics are fundamentally ideologically driven. So why do they lapse? I’ve got a master’s in engineering physics but now work in data science. Here are some reasons I “lapsed”: - I would have loved to be a physicist in 1921, but being one in 2021 is very different. I’d be surprised if there is a single leap in understanding (comparable to general relativity or quantum theory) in my lifetime.…

As someone that just finished a similar master's degree as you I'm very interested in how you made the switch to data science, do you have any advice to share?

Re: Elite Underproduction

#177

Post by thaumasiotes »

lmm wrote: post #169
robbmorganf wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> overproduction of physics PhDs relative to academic positions available Why are positions researching physics so closely tied to academic positions? We probably don't need too many more physics professors but we sure could use more physics research. Or maybe better physics research. Either way, more/better physics discoveries. That said, our scientific communication channels seem filled to the brink. So maybe we ne…

> Why are positions researching physics so closely tied to academic positions? Because it's cheaper that way. A lab that had to pay market-rate salaries would be outcompeted by the ones that sucker grad students with the promise that a few of them might get tenure someday and pay them peanuts in the meantime.

There's nothing stopping the new lab from also offering the possibility of tenure. Why would it be outcompeted?

Re: Elite Underproduction

#178

Post by throw6746 »

kcb wrote: post #173
xyzelement wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not convinced that the rise of China will be so bad. Boomers and neocons want us to think so You're not convinced that going from "living in the most economically dominant and militarily powerful country in the world" to "not" is going to somehow not be a painful experience? You can use the "I am not convinced" line for anything. "I am not convinced that being homeless is worse than living in a nice house" but.…

Aren't you implying that every country besides the US is currently having a painful experience?

Not the OP but these countries do have to put up with America's influence.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#179

Post by lumost »

version_five wrote: post #81
avsteele wrote: post #30

I disagree with the article's premises and conclusions, my perspective is that of a physicist who also knows many lapsed physicists. The premise seems wrong in that he disagrees with the elite overproduction thesis, but the professions he lists are " lawyers, MBA holders,..." and later to finance. But these are the professions likely to be zero-sum. So to me the article really is "I agree with the elite overproductio…

I agree with everything you wrote and you said it better than I was going to. I just want to add that I actually see "lapsed physicist" as a good sign: in physics PHD grads, we have a lot of people who as part of their formation undertook a focused study on some area at the forefront of human knowledge. Only by doing a lot of these studies will be make real advances, because science is mostly finding things that dont…

Alternately, we may be selecting or training those who would be successful through the wrong mechanisms. Those who choose to chase a numerically improbable outcome may not be the most likely to succeed. Tenure commitees weigh a variety of factors including research acumen, teaching ability, office and field politics etc.

Decades of a hypercompetitive market will eventually create entrenched power structures.

Re: Elite Underproduction

#180

Post by novok »

avsteele wrote: post #30

I disagree with the article's premises and conclusions, my perspective is that of a physicist who also knows many lapsed physicists. The premise seems wrong in that he disagrees with the elite overproduction thesis, but the professions he lists are " lawyers, MBA holders,..." and later to finance. But these are the professions likely to be zero-sum. So to me the article really is "I agree with the elite overproductio…

> standard unit of scientific knowledge: "the peer-reviewed publication"

I think part of the problem with shown with the replication crisis, even though it's less in physics, points to an issue with that being the "standard unit" although. Science, like a lot of the world today, "waste enormous potential, mainly in the causes of legibility and standardization" as the author said. A lot of science busywork is subject to goodharts law. When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

https://sketchplanations.com/goodharts-law

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