Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time • Hacker News Board

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#91

Post by jfoutz » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 3:58 PM UTC

ecshafer wrote: post #74

kkylin wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By all accounts it's very hard for grad students and postdocs at LANL (much less locals) to find affordable short-term housing near LANL due to (1) the very small amount of housing available and (2) enough people leaving the lab but continuing to live there while taking up remote work in tech. This is despite LANL paying relatively well (as you noted) to try to keep talent from moving into other industries (tech, fin…

That sounds like an issue with local zoning, otherwise the market would fix that issue.

I haven't been there in a while, but last I recall, they sort of ran out of land. It's very hilly, the airport basically ends at a cliff. A lot of the land is government controlled and fenced off to provide buffer for secure areas.

A lot of land around that is national park/BLM land, and not accessible. So you've got like, white rock, espanola or Santa Fe to commute in from. I did know a guy who had a light plane and would commute from the east side of Albuquerque to Los alamos by plane.

So, sort of like local zoning, but more like DC. an act of congress to free up some of that land, not as straightforward as visiting some city council meetings.

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#92

Post by dlivingston » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:00 PM UTC

ecshafer wrote: post #74

kkylin wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By all accounts it's very hard for grad students and postdocs at LANL (much less locals) to find affordable short-term housing near LANL due to (1) the very small amount of housing available and (2) enough people leaving the lab but continuing to live there while taking up remote work in tech. This is despite LANL paying relatively well (as you noted) to try to keep talent from moving into other industries (tech, fin…

That sounds like an issue with local zoning, otherwise the market would fix that issue.

Los Alamos is on a mesa, with cliffs on one side and Jemez mountains on the other.

There were some local controversies related to zoning when I was there (namely, commercial real estate), but the issue is much broader and long-standing.

I used to work for a PI who, during his internship days in the ~1980s, lived in a tent in the mountains the whole summer (he was a delightfully quirky person though).

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#93

Post by MontyCarloHall » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:05 PM UTC

culi wrote: post #90

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #35

I think academic scientists are criminally underpaid (especially at the NIH), and really hope something can be done to rectify this. However, I don’t think unionization is the way. Ultimately, unions' power comes from the threat of striking. Unions' demands only have teeth because of their ability to completely suspend economic output for an entire company or industry. This is possible because economic output of most…

> Passionate, individually invested scientists are therefore much less likely to voluntarily suspend their work than dispassionate laborers in collective industries. Most of the actual work is done by grad school students and Phd workers. The same demographic that recently set a record for most agreement to go on strike (96+% voting in favor) I don't know where you draw your conclusions from but from my experience wi…

As I wrote in another post, those graduate students were at universities and thus also had teaching duties in addition to their research positions. While the vast majority of those grad students vacated their teaching positions during the strike, many continued with their research. Academic strikes work well at teaching institutions, where the loss of instructor labor is hugely consequential to the university employer (and has no impact on the striking instructors' careers), but not at pure research institutes like the NIH.

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#94

Post by svnt » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:06 PM UTC

robwwilliams wrote: post #85

ghaff wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's an even bigger issue once professional specialists have partners and families. Even elite schools in relatively remote from major population center areas have long had some trouble attracting faculty whose partners may well be inevitably underemployed if they move to the small town/city where the school is.

Disagree again. Here are some towns and smaller cities that more than rival DC. Ann Arbor, Davis, Durham, Urbana, Princeton, New Haven, Memphis, Madison, Portland, Eugene, Nashville, Kansas City…

The data for much of this list of cities has changed substantially in the past two to three years. Many of these are now unaffordable for someone on $45k/year, and they do not have the employment robustness of the larger metros.

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#95

Post by LeanderK » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:11 PM UTC

jfoutz wrote: post #91

ecshafer wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like an issue with local zoning, otherwise the market would fix that issue.

I haven't been there in a while, but last I recall, they sort of ran out of land. It's very hilly, the airport basically ends at a cliff. A lot of the land is government controlled and fenced off to provide buffer for secure areas. A lot of land around that is national park/BLM land, and not accessible. So you've got like, white rock, espanola or Santa Fe to commute in from. I did know a guy who had a light plane and…

why not increase density? it looks like single family home zoning. A denser core would surely be possible

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#96

Post by michaelt » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:16 PM UTC

jfoutz wrote: post #91

ecshafer wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like an issue with local zoning, otherwise the market would fix that issue.

I haven't been there in a while, but last I recall, they sort of ran out of land. It's very hilly, the airport basically ends at a cliff. A lot of the land is government controlled and fenced off to provide buffer for secure areas. A lot of land around that is national park/BLM land, and not accessible. So you've got like, white rock, espanola or Santa Fe to commute in from. I did know a guy who had a light plane and…

Taking a look at some randomly selected roads in Google Street View [1], it looks like it's been built at extremely low density, by most standards.

I mean, if you've building a single-storey home, then putting a double garage on the side, then a gap between properties two cars wide, plus a driveway with parking for two cars, then on-road parking for 3 more cars? Of course you're going to run out of land fast.

I've no idea whether it's a zoning issue, though.

[1] https://goo.gl/maps/ZCtDFNsaoe5ePsp16 https://goo.gl/maps/tTRb7vzw5mVHskHHA etc

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#97

Post by tomrod » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:16 PM UTC

kkylin wrote: post #61

michaelt wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Los Alamos National Lab is a 12,700 person [1] government research facility in a town of 13,200 population [2]. Median household income $98k, highest millionaire concentration of any US city, highest percentage of people with doctorate degrees in the nation. Nearest IKEA store? 500 miles away. A government lab can get scientists to relocate their families to the middle of nowhere. All it takes is a budget of $3.92 bi…

By all accounts it's very hard for grad students and postdocs at LANL (much less locals) to find affordable short-term housing near LANL due to (1) the very small amount of housing available and (2) enough people leaving the lab but continuing to live there while taking up remote work in tech. This is despite LANL paying relatively well (as you noted) to try to keep talent from moving into other industries (tech, fin…

Seems like this would be addressable by the government making affordable living facilities.

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#98

Post by photochemsyn » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:22 PM UTC

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #35

I think academic scientists are criminally underpaid (especially at the NIH), and really hope something can be done to rectify this. However, I don’t think unionization is the way. Ultimately, unions' power comes from the threat of striking. Unions' demands only have teeth because of their ability to completely suspend economic output for an entire company or industry. This is possible because economic output of most…

Unions in Germany get seats on the corporate board, about the same number as the shareholders do. Public universities receiving NIH grants are a bit different in structure, but there are administrative government boards of one sort or the other at all such institutions, and having union representatives on those boards makes a lot of sense. This would mean researchers have more say over things like how much overhead ius taken from individual NIH grants and how that overhead is spent (for things like building maintenance, etc.).

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#99

Post by MontyCarloHall » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:23 PM UTC

photochemsyn wrote: post #98

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #35

I think academic scientists are criminally underpaid (especially at the NIH), and really hope something can be done to rectify this. However, I don’t think unionization is the way. Ultimately, unions' power comes from the threat of striking. Unions' demands only have teeth because of their ability to completely suspend economic output for an entire company or industry. This is possible because economic output of most…

Unions in Germany get seats on the corporate board, about the same number as the shareholders do. Public universities receiving NIH grants are a bit different in structure, but there are administrative government boards of one sort or the other at all such institutions, and having union representatives on those boards makes a lot of sense. This would mean researchers have more say over things like how much overhead i…

If only unions in the US worked like their European counterparts! :(

Re: Thousands of early-career NIH researchers forming union for first time

#100

Post by janeway » Mon, Jun 05, 2023, 4:24 PM UTC

MontyCarloHall wrote: post #35

I think academic scientists are criminally underpaid (especially at the NIH), and really hope something can be done to rectify this. However, I don’t think unionization is the way. Ultimately, unions' power comes from the threat of striking. Unions' demands only have teeth because of their ability to completely suspend economic output for an entire company or industry. This is possible because economic output of most…

All good points but here are three facts that I think are valid:

1. Even if salary comes from individual branches it falls under the institutional tree. Science is not individual.

2. Institution leaders understand that the workers are critical; unionised and enlightened workers will leave to industry for better pay. Both the hot shots and the lower scale.

3. While anecdotal, I had one of the best academic unions worldwide and probably the best academic salary worldwide. I do not think it is a spurious correlation.