Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
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Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#2US government funding of university research and operations is a very important factor. In 2018, almost $150 billion USD in total was invested in universities.
https://datalab.usaspending.gov/colleges-and-universities/
https://www.science.org/content/article/pandemic-pounds-us-u...
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#3I would love an accounting of things that the universities have discovered that have trickled down to the public in the past century.
I'm still using essentially the same internal combustion vehicle, phone, and literally everything that I was using decades ago and more or less that my parents were using. My phone is a little better, that's about it.
What is this 150 billion of our tax dollars a year getting us?
A telescopic photograph of chorizo?
Elon Musk has moved the needle much more than all of the universities combined it seems like.
We just take for granted that giving money to science is a good investment. I've worked in university science labs and they're extremely inefficient, incompetent, and low labor. One view is that this money is scientific welfare.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#4Two US research university professors (presumably funded by a US federal agency, NBER) agreeing that the US has the best research universities doesn't seem very independent.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#5I would love an accounting of things that the universities have discovered that have trickled down to the public in the past century. I'm still using essentially the same internal combustion vehicle, phone, and literally everything that I was using decades ago and more or less that my parents were using. My phone is a little better, that's about it. What is this 150 billion of our tax dollars a year getting us? A tel…
Whom does he hire to help build those cars, rockets and tunnels? Graduates of universities or Oompa Loompas?
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#6Frankly, I find the basic premise of this paper - the explanation for US academic excellence lies in resource allocation and management - questionable. I'd be more interested in a theory of political scientists who explain it as a function of political power. Considering that Germany was the world's research powerhouse in the 19th century, I'd like to see the hypothesis 'You can't have the best universities in the world if you start two world wars and lose them' tested as well.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#7Surely the waves of massive European brain drain around WW2 and the fall of communism had something to do with it. It makes perfect sense that there would be compounding benefits to being the safest most powerful polity in human history.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#8I would love an accounting of things that the universities have discovered that have trickled down to the public in the past century. I'm still using essentially the same internal combustion vehicle, phone, and literally everything that I was using decades ago and more or less that my parents were using. My phone is a little better, that's about it. What is this 150 billion of our tax dollars a year getting us? A tel…
> Elon Musk has moved the needle much more than all of the universities combined it seems like.
This is incredibly narrow-sighted. How many of “Elon Musk’s” (really, the people he employs) achievements have been made possible by foundational scientific research funded by public grants and made available to the broader community? I would argue a nontrivial amount. Much of tech entrepreneurship is technology transfer, not foundational. These are all parts of a complex ecosystem and no one piece is solely responsible for moving the needle.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#9In many European countries advanced research is not conducted in universities.
Re: Why Does the U.S. Have the Best Research Universities? (2020)
#10> Combined with sorting dynamics that concentrated talent and resources at some schools—and the emergence of tenure—this enhanced research performance.
Something tells me this is only part of the story. Yes, after several wars we took in scientists who subsequently brought new ideas, improved teaching, etc to the country.
But this ignores the biggest factor: US universities have tremendous endowments [1]. Having deployable capital that is larger than the GDP of some nations helps not only with the acquisition of the absolute best, but also the maintenance of programs who may not have an obvious path to profit. Moreover US students pay more for their tuition than any other country in the world, further factoring in to the availability of money that can be used for such purposes. Additionally, the US spends the most capital on R&D by the dollar than any other country [2].
In the end, it comes down to money. It doesn't matter if you grow the talent if you can simply purchase the best from where ever it happens to grow.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universit...
[2] https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/021715/what-country...