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

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

#121

Post by ant6n »

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…

Does this explain why Hollywood writing feels so factory-produced these days? The writers guild has turned script writing into a collective, dispassionate activity?

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

#122

Post by ghaff »

dekhn wrote: post #110
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.

this is called "the two body problem" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-body_problem_(career) in reference to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-body_problem and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-body_problem

I didn't know it had a name. But having been associated with both Dartmouth and Cornell, I've definitely heard complaints about the issue.

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

#123

Post by chimeracoder »

KRAKRISMOTT wrote: post #16

It's not going to work. The NIH has no equivalent private sector competitor. For every single researcher, there are 10 other graduates and staff who would be willing to do their job for a fraction of the cost. This is a supply and demand problem, a funding problem. Strip congress and the medical board of their ability to control the number of residency spots and you will see the free market correct itself. Most biolo…

> Strip congress and the medical board of their ability to control the number of residency spots and you will see the free market correct itself.

This is nonsensical. Residency spots are not controlled by the government. Government funding for residency spots is controlled by Congress, because Congress is responsible for all government spending.

The only way to have Congress less involved in residency spots would be to eliminate all government funding for residency programs, but that would have the opposite effect of what you likely want, because residency programs by and large lose money (that's why Congress provides the subsidy in the first place).

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

#124

Post by shpongled »

KRAKRISMOTT wrote: post #43
matthewowen wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is poorly informed. There are many viable alternatives for these researchers. For starters, all the other academic institutions! Which have their own problems, but have been increasing salaries for graduate students and post docs in response to organization (eg Penn just raised biomedical postdoc salaries in large part because of the threat of unionization, and in large part because of the competitive threat of…

Outside of the overfunded Ivies, Stanford and MIT, most other state schools and academic institutions do not have the ability to absorb the sheer quantity of researchers employed by NIH. > It’s also not even remotely true that being an MD is the first choice for researchers You should try talking to some actual graduates in the life sciences department at your local state school, and not just MD-PHDs. I am willing to…

> You should try talking to some actual graduates in the life sciences department at your local state school, and not just MD-PHDs. I am willing to bet money that the number of non-medical biology researchers whose number one choice is medicine outnumbers wannabe researchers.

As a biochem PhD holder, you're really gonna have to back this up.

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

#125

Post by George83728 »

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…

Most early-career researchers are not working on their own individual "widget". Rather, they're working under another more senior researcher on a widget they have relatively little personal stake in.

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

#126

Post by nickff »

EatingWithForks wrote: post #112
MontyCarloHall wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 employe…

Isn't this something trivially resolved by the fact that the union members will be the researchers who can decide how to organize themselves? If they feel that their individual research priorities are more important than organizing for greater protections against sexual harassment or whatever-- that's something that can be voted on!

No, this is not a trivial problem, it is more like a prisoner's dilemma. A great majority of union members can agree that there should be a strike in favor of greater protections, remuneration, or benefits, but it is still in each of their individual interests to continue to work for their own benefits. Put differently, they each want the collective to strike, while continuing their own work. I suspect that a 'strike' would involve most/all of the members delaying submission of findings, but continuing any work that was 'low visibility' (i.e. didn't require outside resources).

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

#127

Post by niemandhier »

Institutions stand to lose enormous amounts of money if NIH researchers go on strike. The reason: delayed clinical trials.

Even more important, in particular this case the individual researcher stand little to loose, since those trials are mostly multi center, multi stakeholders and the individual research drone does not get much credit for its contribution.

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

#128

Post by maedayx »

bourneavent wrote: post #117

Software engineers should do this. We got complacent with the high pay but we were never really in control. Recent layoffs would be less likely to happen were it not for unions.

fully agree - I've been mulling this over a lot recently, actually. It seems like the writing is on the wall in a couple ways (recent layoffs being a big one)

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

#129

Post by moate »

swixmix wrote: post #105
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…

> Ultimately, unions' power comes from the threat of striking. The power comes from the NLRA, a federal law, which is enforced by the NLRB, a federal agency. It’s about agreeing to and enforcing a contract between the workers and the employer. Whether or not to strike then becomes a part of contract negotiation.

No, it comes from the strike. Clean water doesn't come from the EPA, despite it regulating that water should be clean.

Unions have one power in their neutered, current state: collectivism. That's it. It's that simple. Absent the NLRA, unions could still strike (and did, prior to it's passage) as well as any other actions their members were legally allowed to commit that may help. The NLRA is what corporations and unions agreed to stop literal violence and executions around the time of its passage. Frankly I think it fucking sucks and think labor could use a little more wild west, but I'm a firebrand so take that with salt.

(This conversation ultimately boils down to "where do you believe power comes from: liberty granted from government/institutions, or the freedom of the individual to behave as he sees fit in a situation" and hat's a whole other philosophical can of worms)

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