Discussion summary
Top researchers are leaving the USA for the Netherlands, sparking debate on the value of academic research and its funding. Some argue that basic research leads to long-term benefits, while others criticize the current funding system.
What the discussion says
- Research at the edge of knowledge can lead to useful discoveries.
- Much scientific work is long-term and indirectly beneficial.
- Funding issues and the value of basic research are central topics.
- Some believe the US is losing valuable talent to Europe.
“Science work is NOT doing nothing. It leads to modern conveniences.”
“Research at the edge of knowledge sometimes yields very useful results.”
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- Hacker News
- Is there money available to absorb more than a handful of these types of people and their research and related costs?by duxup
- This title is very misrepresentative of the actual article.
This is an article about initiatives to attract scientists to the Netherlands, not about some supposed ongoing brain drain.
by mbmbn - Top researchers in what?by adam_beck
- Top. Men.by moffkalast
- From what I can tell
AI, quantum, vaccines, cancer, Alzheimer's, mental health, nuclear energy, climate, food security, astrophysics, democratic resilience
There isn't a full list of fields or researchers because of privacy or not all researchers have told their current institutions about the change.
- Official page for the Tulip Fund: https://www.nwo.nl/en/calls/tulip-fund
- Actually there are many such headlines, just replace the Netherlands with [China, Singapore, Australia, India].by dwa3592
- This reads more like The Netherlands hopes to bribe US researchers into moving to the Netherlands.by luma
- I for one am still waiting for US tech companies to bribe me to come work for them.by Cthulhu_
- Then the US used to bribe our researchers. It's tit-for-tat in this case.by tgv
- why do you call paying someone legally a "bribe" ?by vincnetas
- I apologise if this is overly negative. It is based on my experience working as a soft money researcher (my own grants) at a Dutch university. My opinions may not be shared.
In my experience The Netherlands is a rather unsupportive place to do research. There is essentially no money from the government that will pay salaries in full, especially early career salaries (vini, vidi, vici). I have had friends win ERC grants (millions in euros) that were fired as a result because there was not a space in the department to hire them full time (Dutch work law requires contracts to become permanent after a certain number of years of working). Departments also seem to have glass ceilings for non Dutch. Researchers are often given large teaching commitments that cannot be bought out with grants. University incubators seem to be better suited to let professors pretend to be start up founders then actual innovation centers. I have tried on multiple occasions to engage the local incubator and have always been run around. Yet local Dutch have no issues. The rules seem to be different for Dutch than for foreigners. A foreign colleague was offered a lucrative consulting contract (a normal thing for successful professors at other universities). The Dutch university he was at refused to let him take it except under the understanding the money would be entirely consumed by the university and he would receive no compensation for bringing in private money even though he would be doing all of the work. Meanwhile the Dutch colleague in the next office was allowed to start a private consulting agency through the local incubator and spend as much time as he wanted working in the start up. The universities publish reports how progressive they are by evaluating professors on teaching and outreach meanwhile having internal department expectations of PhD students to publish at least four first author papers or are not allowed to graduate (on four year contracts with one year full time teaching commitment). In my experience it is rare that PhD students finish on time. As one adminstrator told me, “university promoters are more interested in promoting their careers then their PhD students” (promoter is the word used for the adviser). The universities also disallow working outside of typical hours and there is no ability to work in your own office on the weekends. Also, recently they defended against this, but it will come up again, the government has discussed changing the tax law such that startup shares will have real world value so new valuations become taxable events.
This all is not atypical to universities world wide. But in the Netherlands I have not found a place that made me feel like I could work to the best of my ability and at the cutting edge. This is unfortunate. It’s nice to live here but I’m leaving to go to greener pastures.
by mnky9800n - I see a lot of complaining from small companies and startups. The taxing system is slowly becoming communism (I have no better word). And they also are stopping farming, based on bad ideas.
I tried to get into fundamental research, but disliked the burocratic approach in Dutch universities.
by zyxzevn - > It’s nice to live here but I’m leaving to go to greener pastures.
May I ask where you're looking? What countries have the best support for you to do your best work?
by pavel_lishin - > that were fired as a result because there was not a space in the department to hire them full time (Dutch work law requires contracts to become permanent after a certain number of years of working).
This is a very common law in european companies and is killing economic growth. Idk why they do this.
by daedrdev - The US is accidentally conducting Operation Paperclip but in reverse. Who will benefit the most from it, China or Europe ?by goldenarm
- Is it an accident though? This seems very deliberateby bergen
- Not sure if accidentally is the correct term, given the anti-intellectual platformby usrusr
- There are any number of smaller region/states that are already benefiting. Singapore comes to mind. Leading labs are all setting up in Singapore and both 1) internally-transferring their previously US-based talents on work visa to Singapore, and 2) using Singapore as a base for Asia hires, mostly notably from China.by fhe
- Probably Europe. Seems more attractive for researchers. China is probably too different to be attractive for most Americans.by amarant
- China is not very immigration friendly to non-han folks, but I guess chinese researchers won't make it to the US and this already will have a great effect on the chinese economy.
Europe is in its own set of problems and it is not in the same situation that US used to be after WW2 (only major economy not affected by bombing).
Europe's problems:
* active major war in Ukraine (lasting longer than Axis/Soviet war in WW2)
* energy supply issues (unlike US it's not energy sufficient and the places that supply it with energy are involved with wars)
* a wall of people aging away from employment and into doctor's and hospital waiting rooms (forcing less investment into research and roads/bridges/railway, more towards stabilizing pensions, healthcare)
* major pieces of the european export economy are being replaced by China (eg chinese car brands eating the lunch of european car brands).
by est31 - This title is such clickbait. All the article talks about is a Dutch fund created to recruit scientists and they have successfully recruited them. At 1 million euros per head.by cdash
- Seems accurate enough to me. That’s not a ton of money to uproot your life over tbh. Shows there’s willingness to leave with a little bit of incentive.by Forgeties79
- > At 1 million euros per head.
Over 5 years...
by VWWHFSfQ - They have the first 34 researchers, all from top universities and institutes. That’s a major achievement, because as the article says, every researcher brings new knowledge as well as a whole international network with them.by JSR_FDED
- That's not a truthful translation of the article's headline, BTW.
More correct would be "First international scientists to the Netherlands via the Tulip Fund", which is a far cry from the title as submitted.
by andsoitis - Because I was flagged, with no reason or excuse, to those who actually manually viewed the now invisible comment and wonder the reference, please see:
Considering the grim reality of our fiscal derangement, and the context, I think the reaction here was a bit obtuse. Or maybe I'm beleaguered by Taylor Swift fans.... and economists, which I think have very similar discretionhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulip_maniaby eth0up - Great initiative, and good to see that it has an effect. I'm a bit sceptical about the available funds. 1 million over 5 years is a nice starting package (4+ PhD students), but the availability of overall research grant money in the Netherlands has been under pressure for years and is difficult to acquire. Researchers moving here may find it difficult to acquire further grant money compared to US, at least in CS.by jesdo
- It'll be on top of any other grants and funding available for research though.by Cthulhu_
- I could only find 4 names:
1 full prof at Vanderbilt with a real research program who has been listed as PI on a bunch of grants. "Top researcher" may be generous, but based on nothing I'd say reasonable description.
The other 3: 1 is a VU Amsterdam PhD who was on a Netherlands Government funded 24-month postdoc in Harvard who's been at VU Amsterdam since 2017. 1 is an adjunct (on leave) prof from Israel who has worked at a few german universities, most recently an Munster (doesn't qualify for the 30% rule). The last resigned over a year ago and has been contracting at a couple UK universities.
This seems less like "Top researchers leave USA" and more like "Typical Academic Bag Chasing"
by amoshebb