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How the U.S. became a science superpower

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Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#211

Post by makeitdouble »

tkiolp4 wrote: post #183
cs702 wrote: post #7

Worth reading in its entirety. The following four paragraphs, about post-WWII funding of science in Britain versus the US, are spot-on, in my view: > Britain’s focused, centralized model using government research labs was created in a struggle for short-term survival. They achieved brilliant breakthroughs but lacked the scale, integration and capital needed to dominate in the post-war world. > The U.S. built a decent…

Such a “simple” solution. Wonder why doing a PhD in the majority of european countries is equal to a poor monthly income. Just pay them more. I guess countries don’t like long term solutions.

I was curious how much of a gap there is, and landed on about 100k in the US[0] vs 85k[1] USD in France for instance, in average.

That sounds on par with most other professions where the US salary is about a third higher, with a cost of living (health, housing etc) eating most of the difference.

Perhaps I'm also not buying that the US has a fundamentally better system, and not just a dominant position to begin with, with tons of money to invest and raise an army of researchers. Comparing to China could be a more interesting exercise, as it's also flooded with money now and is getting competitive in research.

[0] https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/Phd-Researcher-Salary

[1] https://publication.enseignementsup-recherche.gouv.fr/eesr/F...

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#212

Post by AnthonyMouse »

consumer451 wrote: post #138
monknomo wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, a relatively easy fix to a negative replacement rate (at least when you have a well-run, wealthy, attractive country) is immigration. Replacement rate isn't a problem when you let more folks in

I agree, but this only works if one is willing to accept a changing racial profile/culture. It appears that many people do not accept this idea. Not just in the USA, but look at Japan or South Korea, for example. To me, the really interesting question is how to stop what appears to have been inevitable for the last 40+ years: when an economy becomes "advanced," the birth rates drop to tragic levels. I believe what co…

> when an economy becomes "advanced," the birth rates drop to tragic levels. I believe what could help here involves all kinds of non-market solutions which are hard to solve, and very not cool at the moment.

There is a huge factor in this which is well-documented to reduce the fertility rate: The first generation to become affluent enough to own property does so and then lobbies for policies that increase home prices. These policies create housing scarcity both for homes and rental units.

That saddles later generations with unreasonably high housing costs and makes them unable to afford to start a family, so the fertility rate drops. If you want more kids, build more housing.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#213

Post by mlazos »

jack_h wrote: post #52
cs702 wrote: post #7

Worth reading in its entirety. The following four paragraphs, about post-WWII funding of science in Britain versus the US, are spot-on, in my view: > Britain’s focused, centralized model using government research labs was created in a struggle for short-term survival. They achieved brilliant breakthroughs but lacked the scale, integration and capital needed to dominate in the post-war world. > The U.S. built a decent…

> In 2025, with the abandonment of U.S. government support for university research, the long run of U.S. dominance in science may be over. I find it amazing that this is the conclusion when earlier in the article it was stated that "[Britain] was teetering on bankruptcy. It couldn’t afford the broad and deep investments that the U.S. made." The US debt is starting to become an existential problem. Last year the secon…

The idea that cutting research will make a dent in the budget is a fantasy. NSF has a budget of 10 billion. Stop rationalizing gutting crucial programs because of “the deficit” Medicare, social security and the military are the main costs in the US budget. Sure universities are bloated, tackle that problem separately then.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#214

Post by [deleted] »

FredPret wrote: post #175
linksnapzz wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was; now we have bailouts. "Too big to fail".

While true, you overstate the problem. Look up the companies in the S&P 500 today, 10 years ago, 20, 30, 50. There are dramatic changes with only a handful of long term survivors.

[deleted]

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#215

Post by patagurbon »

jack_h wrote: post #52
cs702 wrote: post #7

Worth reading in its entirety. The following four paragraphs, about post-WWII funding of science in Britain versus the US, are spot-on, in my view: > Britain’s focused, centralized model using government research labs was created in a struggle for short-term survival. They achieved brilliant breakthroughs but lacked the scale, integration and capital needed to dominate in the post-war world. > The U.S. built a decent…

> In 2025, with the abandonment of U.S. government support for university research, the long run of U.S. dominance in science may be over. I find it amazing that this is the conclusion when earlier in the article it was stated that "[Britain] was teetering on bankruptcy. It couldn’t afford the broad and deep investments that the U.S. made." The US debt is starting to become an existential problem. Last year the secon…

US research funding is not what you want to cut though. It is among the most productive funding possible and there is evidence aplenty that it pays for itself many times over.

University bureaucracy is by and large fairly small for research. When you get into undergraduate education I will agree the administration has been bloated by the current system. But research has been surprisingly lean in my experience.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#216

Post by Retric »

consumer451 wrote: post #138
monknomo wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, a relatively easy fix to a negative replacement rate (at least when you have a well-run, wealthy, attractive country) is immigration. Replacement rate isn't a problem when you let more folks in

I agree, but this only works if one is willing to accept a changing racial profile/culture. It appears that many people do not accept this idea. Not just in the USA, but look at Japan or South Korea, for example. To me, the really interesting question is how to stop what appears to have been inevitable for the last 40+ years: when an economy becomes "advanced," the birth rates drop to tragic levels. I believe what co…

I think you need to consider history if you think this is a new thing. People literally paid for indentured servants, even outside of the slave trade.

Importing cheap labor has been a constant throughout the countries history, look at camps of people building the railroads you’ll see lots of Chinese people etc.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#217

Post by patagurbon »

jack_h wrote: post #117
Retric wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US government funding of science isn’t a net cost due to taxes on the long term economic productivity that results. This is unlike say corn subsidies which not only reduce economic efficiency but also have direct negative heath impacts furthering the harm. Medicare spending is problematic because it’s consumptive, but there’s ways to minimize the expense without massively reducing care. The VA for example dramaticall…

Even if those attribution studies are 100% correct that doesn’t mean this system optimally allocates resources. The ultimate issue with our social programs is due to demographics. An aging population whose replacement rate is projected to go negative (more deaths than births) within the next few years is catastrophic for the way we fund those programs. We absolutely should try and reduce their operating costs though;…

No system will optimally allocate resources. However projects are typically funded under competitive grants and that process is fairly good at moving slowly but methodically in the right direction.

Even when it doesn’t, it is training researchers who can enter systems which have different incentives like private research and development. That is a massive positive externality.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#219

Post by blululu »

xeonmc wrote: post #207
blululu wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience Chinese academics are far more bilingual than western ones. I think that for Chinese academics the English publications are generally of a higher quality and more prestigious, but I’m sure that too will change over time. I can definitely say that Chinese publications have gotten much better in terms of quality over the last 20 years and there are now a lot of results worth translating. At this point…

Chinese language publications may eventually serve the role of rapid communications, but for important results it will always be in English due to their ”trophy culture”.

That makes sense. The same trend is already happening in the west with Arxiv and Bioarxiv. Neither is as prestigious for the purpose of a lot of facility politics/rankings but in an active field both are more meaningful markers of the cutting edge than prestige publications like nature. I imagine these journals will retain their function as markers of prestige even as most of the community’s research output happens in more informal channels.

Re: How the U.S. became a science superpower

#220

Post by boxed »

blululu wrote: post #176
ecshafer wrote: post #41

There are a couple fundamental flaws here: One is that the number one Science and Engineering powerhouse prior to WWII was Germany, not Britain. Two this totally neglects that the US received the lion's share of Scientists and Mathematicians from countries like Germany, Hungary, Poland etc with the encroachment of the Soviets and persecution of the Jewish people. While the down up approach of the US and heavy funding…

Prior to WWII the United States was the world's leading power in terms of Science, Engineering and Industry - not Germany or the British Empire. The reason that Central European scientists fled to America (and not Britain) is because the United States had the scientific, engineering and industrial base to absorb them. Consider some of the major scientific breakthroughs to come out of the US leading up to and coming o…

> Prior to WWII the United States was the world's leading power in terms of Science, Engineering and Industry - not Germany or the British Empire

Per capita? The US had a larger population.

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