> An early-career biological anthropologist said she was still awaiting contract details from AMU before putting pen to paper because of salary discrepancies, though she took comfort in the fact that the cost of living is lower in France — especially considering that education for her two children, who she said were eager to settle in Marseille, would be free.
Researcher are severely under paid in France (young researcher often earn barely more than the minimum wage). I doubt she will find the salary to her expectation (though the very strong worker right, and 5 weeks vacation might compensate for that).
In general, research is severely underfunded in France. That is nice that we try to make a gesture toward researcher under threat, but how many of them will we be able to keep when they realized the struggle of getting any funding for research here...
jltsiren · 14h ago
Researchers are underpaid and research is underfunded everywhere. Like most jobs that people find inherently interesting.
I don't know about the specific situation in France. In general, Europe spends more on academic research than the US, both in absolute terms and as a fraction of GDP. However, it's easier to make an academic career in the US. Because the gap between academic and industry salaries is wider in the US, Americans are more likely to leave the academia after PhD. And because employment-based immigration is particularly difficult in the US, many would-be immigrants end up doing a PhD without any intention of staying in the academia. Which means you have less competition if you stay in the academia in the US.
vorpalhex · 9h ago
> In general, Europe spends more on academic research than the US, both in absolute terms and as a fraction of GDP.
> An early-career biological anthropologist said she was still awaiting contract details from AMU before putting pen to paper because of salary discrepancies, though she took comfort in the fact that the cost of living is lower in France — especially considering that education for her two children, who she said were eager to settle in Marseille, would be free.
> The university’s president insisted that participants in the “Safe Place for Science” program would be paid the same wages as French researchers. The statement sought to appease concerns within France’s academic community that money would now be focused on drawing U.S. scientists whereas local researchers have long complained of insufficient funding.
> But the biological anthropologist said a more carefree life could compensate for a lower salary. "There’ll be a lot less stress as a whole, politically, academically," she reflected.
maeln · 14h ago
The underfunding is not addressed, and it is not even a subject in France right now. This specific researcher might be fine with a more carefree life (that is, what she thinks might be a more carefree life), but the general issue remains.
spacemadness · 13h ago
At least it beats being attacked by your government daily for having the audacity to become a scientist. Especially if you publish science that isn’t politically convenient.
zzzeek · 14h ago
you get to live in France, have free health care and school for your kids (and I bet these underpaid researchers in france actually get completely unheard of in the US things like modest pensions). How much do you actually need to be paid? Most Americans would materially benefit from such an exchange
> According to the OECD, 'household disposable income is income available to households such as wages and salaries, income from self-employment and unincorporated enterprises, income from pensions and other social benefits, and income from financial investments (less any payments of tax, social insurance contributions and interest on financial liabilities). 'Gross' means that depreciation costs are not subtracted.'[1] This indicator also takes account of social transfers in kind 'such as health or education provided for free or at reduced prices by governments and not-for-profit organisations.'
United States: 62,300
France: 45,548
Americans need to be more grateful for what they have.
saubeidl · 13h ago
Disposable income is a poor metric to use though.
Money isn't everything. The french have better public transport, more social stability, a life expectancy that's higher by five (!) years etc etc.
By pretty much whatever standard you use, their quality of life is much higher.
rank0 · 12h ago
Look, I am not saying life is inherently better in America vs France. This thread started as a debate about wages and social benefits. If you're truly interested in a good faith discussion on that topic, the metrics I'm highlighting are essential. If you've already cemented your opinion and just have a bone to pick with the United States there's probably not much common ground we can find.
> Disposable income is a poor metric to use though.
Hard Disagree. It's directly related to standard of living. You're also leaving out the other parts. It's adjusted for PPP, taxes, essential household costs (healthcare, shelter, etc), and social benefits.
> Money isn't everything. The french have better public transport, more social stability, a life expectancy that's higher by five (!) years etc etc.
Of course money isn't everything...but again we started off by talking about it.
> By pretty much whatever standard you use, their quality of life is much higher.
I stand by my statement. Too many Americans don't appreciate how good they have it. Cultural differences are real.
saubeidl · 12h ago
I think if you're a person that is primarily focused on economic indicators, I can see your point.
Because you mentioned it, I do think a lot of this comes down to cultural differences. To me (and to most Europeans!), the economic stuff just doesn't matter as much, so it's not a compelling argument to make.
I had excellent cheap pasta on a beautiful plaza in Italy yesterday, I got there via 30 euro Ryanair flight, and I booked it over my abundant PTO. At no point exploring Florence, a city of 400.000 people, did I feel unsafe at all.
That, to me, is the kind of stuff that really matters and the kind of stuff that I just can't have in the US.
It's also the kind of stuff that is hard to capture in economic stats, which is why I don't really pay as much attention to them.
I've lived in the US for almost a decade. I made a lot more money, but my life felt worse.
But maybe Americans really do just have different values and they'd rather have more money on their bank account.
I upvoted you because you argued your point well.
It's just that we're talking past each other, quality of life is so much more than that. It's the environment you live in. It's knowing that a random piece of bread you'll buy in a supermarket or in a train station will have a certain level of quality. It's cheese that doesn't taste like plastic. It's having time to spend with your loved ones. It's nobody having to worry about a medical emergency bankrupting them. It's higher education not being gated to the well-off.
FirmwareBurner · 11h ago
>To me (and to most Europeans!), the economic stuff just doesn't matter as much
Then why did you move to make more money in the US? Why are many young Europeans moving to work abroad?
People who gaslight others for chasing money, are those who already have enough money and can't empathize with those wo do not.
>I had excellent cheap pasta on a beautiful plaza in Italy yesterday, I got there via 30 euro Ryanair flight
Cherry picking personal holiday travels isn't representative of anything in this topic. Also 30 Euro flights are not the norm everywhere. You need to live in the right country/city and get lucky.
saubeidl · 11h ago
It's just to illustrate a point regarding quality of life.
Experiences like these are just straight up impossible in the US. Believe me, I've tried. There's no nice Italian plazas anywhere and in most places in the country you wouldn't even wanna be sitting outside.
nec4b · 10h ago
Is it possible for you drive over the border to Mexico and have best Mexican food costing almost nothing. Can you fly to Caribbean or Hawaii over the weekend? Can you camp in Grand Canyon, Yosemite or Yellowstone?
Your view is in no way representative of a typical European who cares a lot more about money then you. Money, which you ironically made in the states.
FirmwareBurner · 11h ago
Touristic spots are taste dependent subjective, not indicative of objective quality of life metrics.
saubeidl · 11h ago
But Florence is a real city, where real people live. As is the city I live in and it, too, has plenty such spots.
There is very few places in the US where I would like to sit outside on a plaza and have my dinner - and that is indicative of social decay and a lack of focus on building pleasant public spaces.
FirmwareBurner · 11h ago
A lot of people don't care about having Italian plazas on daily basis, like my German ex-boss who just moved to the US, and probably also Italians who move abroad for jobs. You keep harping on about one point that matters to you personally but even you don't live in Italy. Why is that?
Europe also doesn't have grand canyons. I don't need to see a grand canyon every month though.
>- and that is indicative of social decay and a lack of focus on building pleasant public spaces.
Go to Frankfurt train station.
saubeidl · 11h ago
It is not I who keeps harping on about this point. I listed a whole number of points in the post you cherry-picked this one from.
Feel free to address the others instead!
No comments yet
const_cast · 7h ago
It's important to note as someone living in the US, most of our cost of living is completely invisible. We have thousands of "small" invisible taxes tacked on to everything we do.
Benefits are expensive, healthcare is expensive, transportation is expensive, food is expensive, and on and on. It's quite hard to just compare the US to France because of that. I think a lot of this "disposable income" relies on you being an able-bodied person of young age with zero health conditions and zero risk of emergencies. As soon as that's not the case, that "disposable" income vanishes.
maeln · 12h ago
From my anecdotal evidence (so it proves nothing), it seems like being poor / middle class in France is better than in the U.S. But being high-middle class / rich / in the owner class, is better in the U.S, since you already don't need the socialized healthcare, you actively seek segregated places to live, you do not take the public transport (or at least that often), etc, but you do get to enjoy all the amenities for rich people that the U.S offer, which is way more than France since it has a higher volume of rich people.
saubeidl · 12h ago
That is, if you don't mind higher crime numbers, literal shit on the streets, a traffic system that is fundamentally broken due to overreliance on cars, a persistent chance of getting shot, a lack of pleasant third spaces to hang out in and a general bad conscience due to the reality of living in a near-palace while your fellow citizens live in cardboard boxes on the street.
I've lived in the US for a while and while I'm not incredibly wealthy, my net worth is easily in the seven figures. I ended up moving away for the above reasons.
zorobo · 11h ago
I assume you are not living in Paris then.
Here in Paris:
- housing is expensive
- it's not cardboard boxes, it's tents
- you'd be mugged/knifed rather than shot, agreed
- public transportation is good when not on strike. However, it's dirty and you might get robbed
- the world's most creative government when it comes to taxes
- it's still beautiful though…
saubeidl · 11h ago
I don't live in Paris. Generally, I don't love cities >2M inhabitants.
The parts of Paris I went to recently were quite nice, but of course, a tourists view is different from a locals.
I'd be surprised if it was anywhere near as bad as, say the SF tenderloin though.
FirmwareBurner · 11h ago
>my net worth is easily in the seven figures. I ended up moving away for the above reasons.
Easy to high road others now, AFTER you made 7 figures in the country you now publicly despise, and wouldn't be able to where you're originally from.
Why try to emotionally pull the ladder?
zzzeek · 9h ago
Yeah I didn't say "richer" I said "better"
Invictus0 · 14h ago
> free healthcare
> earn 40k/yr
> get taxed 30% on it
jonathanlb · 13h ago
> get taxes 30% on it
As opposed to paying more out of pocket or getting denied a claim? No thank you.
betaby · 5h ago
As opposed to paying the same rate and still not having functioning health care.
Hello from Quebec, Canada,
zzzeek · 14h ago
can bike to work without being run down by a 10 ft high pickup truck, I dunno sign me up maybe
probably_wrong · 14h ago
> The university’s president insisted that participants in the “Safe Place for Science” program would be paid the same wages as French researchers. The statement sought to appease concerns within France’s academic community that money would now be focused on drawing U.S. scientists whereas local researchers have long complained of insufficient funding.
I think the University's president is being cheeky or directly obtuse. Sure, US refugee researchers will get the same wage as a French researcher, but that's poor comfort for the French researchers who would have otherwise gotten those positions.
I understand that the University is aiming at getting top researchers for peanuts which wouldn't be a bad deal for French science as a whole, but it is still a bad deal for the French science community.
kouru225 · 14h ago
You think it’s a bad thing that French researchers will have direct access to the “top researchers”???
Sounds like a major benefit to French researchers
probably_wrong · 14h ago
It's only a benefit for the French researchers who can get a position in France. Those who can't are already forced to emigrate (and we're back to where we started) or to quit science entirely.
But retention is also a problem. How many of those scientists will stay in Aix-Marseille? Refugees, almost by definition, go back to their country once things calm down. And life in a country where you don't speak the language is not conducive to staying there long.
I'm not saying everything will be bad - there's a plus associated to getting great minds for cheap. But if I were a French scientist fighting for grants I would definitely feel odd about my country explicitly telling me "French need not apply".
saubeidl · 14h ago
I think they're talking about other French researchers, which will now have to compete with these "refugees" for positions.
busterarm · 14h ago
And the ascending French political right will paint this as a continuance of decades of French policy prioritizing immigrants over French people.
So when they eventually have the political reigns, this policy will end and these researchers will have to start over somewhere else.
saubeidl · 13h ago
I don't think the cordon sanitaire will break any time soon.
spacemadness · 13h ago
Isn’t this the same argument that America should kick out non American students and would be researchers from American universities? Either way it’s protectionist. Basically what Trump supports but in France.
UncleEntity · 10h ago
That's exactly what I was thinking...
Some may argue that the (former) US policy of attracting the world's best students and researchers was good for the country as a whole. Perhaps even lead to some industries being far superior to foreign competitors?
Unfortunately, those 'some' aren't currently setting policy.
ThinkBeat · 14h ago
I wonder what the mixture of academics will apply and who will be picked.
Clearly professors or scholars in Women's studies / gender studies, critical race theory, and climate science are the ones worst hit by the current leadership in the US.
KittenInABox · 14h ago
> Clearly professors or scholars in Women's studies / gender studies, critical race theory, and climate science are the ones worst hit by the current leadership in the US.
Source?? Here's the thing, as far as I know, women's studies/gender studies, crt, whatever... they're cheap, mostly phd students doing mass surveys of interviews or studying metadata. The expensive stuff is engineering, clinical trials, specialized equipment for labs... that stuff is also being hit.
malcolmgreaves · 14h ago
It’s also all science across the board. The Republicans have made sure that research goes underfunded.
ryandv · 13h ago
> Clearly professors or scholars in Women's studies / gender studies
Good riddance. The standards for scholarship in these fields are laughable; see how Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work accepted for publication a form of Mein Kampf, rewritten to use more modern inclusive and feminist language [0] [1].
If your field of study is so epistemically bankrupt and your systems of review so defective as to not be able to identify Nazi ideology when a few words are swapped around, and to then accept those ideas for publication, it's not clear to me that you should be receiving any funding at all - particularly when it's those same fields that are so vocally and vociferously against this ideology.
The replication crisis hit the STEM chadlingers pretty hard as well. They are still bitter about it. As for the hoax? Garbage to sell books to the peanut galleria.
UncleEntity · 10h ago
> ee how Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work accepted for publication a form of Mein Kampf, rewritten to use more modern inclusive and feminist language
Was that a troll or a serious endeavor?
Because, as a troll, it's pretty funny...
curiousgal · 14h ago
I genuinely feel for them. This is nothing but a stunt, once they have to renew their visas and experience the systemic anti-immigration bureaucratic machine they will regret moving there.
I've always maintained that US academia would pay dearly for the Trump administration's views on ahhh... climate change during the Little Ice Age period from roughly the 16th to 19th centuries.
rsynnott · 14h ago
Not sure if you're just being obtuse, but, er, I mean, yeah, climate science is in a lot of trouble under ol' minihands.
Am4TIfIsER0ppos · 14h ago
Give me your passport! I want in!
linotype · 14h ago
> Speaking from the university’s hilltop astrophysics lab, AMU President Eric Berton likened the situation to that of European academics who fled persecution by Nazi Germany both before and during World War II.
This is offensive on so many levels, not least of which to history.
Why is it offensive? The current US administration has an outgroup they say ludicrous things about (do you remember the "eating pets" bit?), and have started rounding them up (by masked men in unidentified vehicles and without uniforms) with no due process to send to camps (often abroad).
Various scientific research areas have also been the focus of extensive and frankly asinine criticism. Do you remember when the orange guy drew a hurricane with a sharpie? Or when he proposed nuking it? Or when various research funding was killed by DOGE, often with blatant misrepresentations of what the research was? What about the brain dead woman kept as an incubator?
Various media organisations have been sued on flimsy at best pretenses to silence them (like the CBS trial which was just settled).
If anyone is failing to see the similarities to other historical far right rises to and centralisation of power, they're lacking in knowledge on these, or stand to benefit.
linotype · 11h ago
It’s offensive because it compares the idiotic and fascist behavior of the current US administration with the behavior of the European Nazis, who murdered millions during the Holocaust, downplaying the massive suffering caused by the Germans.
saubeidl · 11h ago
In German we have a saying: "Wehret den Anfängen." It literally translates to "Beware the Beginnings".
As somebody who's history education was mostly centered around said beginnings, let me tell you, things sound real familiar right now, and not in a good way.
If you're interested, read this excerpt of a book based on post-war interviews with Germans about the rise of Nazism and see if any of it sounds familiar: https://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/511928.htm
sofixa · 11h ago
It doesn't downplay anything. The Nazis didn't start by slaughtering millions, they did a bunch of other things before that to establish their rule, and importantly, to clarify who the outgroup is, deny them rights, and paint them as the bad subhumans in front of everyone. While planning deportations (e.g. the Madagascar plan) and rounding up some of them, as well as detractors in camps.
That's roughly at the stages where the idiotic and fascist US administration currently is at. Ignoring the parallels serves no purpose. That's not to say they will move on the next stage (industrial extermination) like the Nazis did.
762236 · 14h ago
American universities that avoid ideology and embrace thought diversity, i.e., they employ conservatives, will be fine.
saubeidl · 14h ago
Do you not see the irony in your statement?
What is conservatism if not an ideology?
All you're saying is universities that align with the prevalent ideology of the authoritarian regime will be fine. Congrats, you're now the Soviet Union.
travisgriggs · 14h ago
I think the OP was posting somewhat tongue in cheek. Sardonic even.
saubeidl · 14h ago
Poe's law at work. It is impossible to tell.
verdverm · 14h ago
check their comment history...
tjs8rj · 14h ago
The problem is our public institutions (universities) are using public dollars on things that are not desired by the public.
Institutions have accountability to the people. Nobody except a fringe wants universities to be maga centers, most people just want them to reflect “common sense” and forward the will of the American people
maeln · 13h ago
> The problem is our public institutions (universities) are using public dollars on things that are not desired by the public.
That are not desired by the public until it is. A lot of people might find research in advance and quite esoteric math useless, as it does not produce any benefit to them. That is until those research yield something that can be used in a way, or in another field, where it does impact their lives.
The issue is that you cannot easily tell what is useful or not. Some research have a clear goal, who, if achieved, will yield very tangible benefit, but they might never reach it.
On the other hand, something that seems impenetrable to the average man might yield incredible benefit.
Without the freedom to explore, nothing would ever be found.
kentm · 14h ago
Public universities should not be beholden to the public in what they research. It’s important that institutions are able to make conclusions that are true and expand human knowledge despite certain portions of the population not liking those conclusions.
I would also dispute your assertion that “no one wants universities to be maga centers.” Leaders on the right have said that they do want that, or at least the right wing American mythos to be uncritically taught and not challenged.
epistasis · 14h ago
This is simply untrue and backforming extreme right-wing ideology as a reason for why people voted for a ln entire candidate.
One things that fascists do when voted into power is assume that any random strange ideology as part of the platform is now so popular that it must override existing law and procedure, and that is exactly what Trump is doing here. Which is why these researchers are leaving. Not because they are doing something the public dislikes. The public looooves scientific research.
762236 · 14h ago
If a university has thought diversity, their demographics will match America's: they'll employ around 50% conservatives. If they have like 3% conservatives, as many do, that is a good sign that they are captured by an ideology, and then the question becomes, why should conservatives support institutions with federal money that actively spread an ideology that excludes conservatives? If the universities want to continue this way, they should pursue First Amendment religious protection.
saubeidl · 14h ago
Your core assumption is false. Education is not evenly distributed alongside ideologies.
Education is negatively correlated with conservatism, thus a sample of a job requiring higher education will not be representative of the general public.
That is, in 19% of jobs it is an official, open requirement. It's safe to assume the unofficial discrimination is higher.
saubeidl · 14h ago
... according to a far-right activist group that cowrote Project 2025.
like_any_other · 14h ago
It's not a secret - perhaps this source is more palatable to you, although it lacks exact figures: Mathematicians divided over faculty hiring practices that require proof of efforts to promote diversity - https://www.science.org/content/article/mathematicians-divid...
Or this one: A recent report from the Goldwater Institute found that 80% of job postings for Arizona’s public universities required applicants to submit a statement detailing their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. - https://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/policy-report/the-new-loy...
Historical employment rates of conservatives at universities were much higher than now.
saubeidl · 14h ago
That was in a time when conservatism wasn't openly anti-science and anti-scientific process.
762236 · 14h ago
I started voting for Republicans because I watched Democrats become anti-science, e.g., gender-affirming care. Anyone with ideology rejects science, which includes people from both parties, but currently my life is impacted in a negative way by liberal ideology, not conservative ideology (conservatives actually talk with me, while liberals shun me if I ask for evidence).
const_cast · 7h ago
> I started voting for Republicans because I watched Democrats become anti-science, e.g., gender-affirming care.
Gender-affirming care is not "anti-science", you just don't understand the science.
Gender-affirming care is not saying that people can change their biological sex. It was never that. That was, and will remain, a conservative hallucination.
Gender-affirming care is about curtailing the effects of gender dysphoria and improving the quality of life of transgender individuals, and some cisgender individuals. Which is science-backed. It works. Gender-affirming care leads to better outcomes for transgender individuals, period.
The problem here with you, and other's, is that you're just arguing the wrong points. You might not think gender dysphoria is real or that it matters, but that's not the conversation. The conversation is "does gender-affirming care help people and improve outcomes". Which yes, it does.
Whether those people deserve to be helped is not a scientific question. It's a political one. Please, know and understand the difference.
saubeidl · 14h ago
There's no such thing as being "without ideology". To quote Zizek, leading expert on ideology:
> I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology. The material force of ideology - makes me not see what I'm effectively eating. It's not only our reality which enslaves us. The tragedy of our predicament - when we are within ideology, is that - when we think that we escape it into our dreams - at that point we are within ideology.
maeln · 13h ago
> I started voting for Republicans because I watched Democrats become anti-science, e.g., gender-affirming care.
No, you decided to vote republicans when you stop agreeing with some of the science.
> (conservatives actually talk with me, while liberals shun me if I ask for evidence)
The definition and constituents of "conservatives" has changed over that same time
bilbo0s · 14h ago
Maybe conservatives of, say, the Greatest Generation, were simply better educated?
verdverm · 14h ago
Dental assistants are significantly female. Should we defund them until they are more representative? How many other industries and professions are like this?
Also, America is not 50% conservative. The split is more like thirds, i.e. America is non-binary
const_cast · 7h ago
> If a university has thought diversity, their demographics will match America's: they'll employ around 50% conservatives.
Well sure, but you're missing a very key component here: conservatives are ideologically opposed to education, especially public education. It's a foundational part of American conservative ideology.
Yeah, that influences things.
ap99 · 14h ago
Your response reveals the way you're thinking about this.
i.e. If I accept and employ a conservative person then I'm aligning with conservative values and betraying liberal values.
What the GP is proposing is abandoning this black and white thinking, or in other words: accepting diversity of thought.
(Waiting for downvotes from the HN echo chamber that abhors diversity of thought.)
saubeidl · 14h ago
That is straight up not what's happening though and the "diversity of thought" framing is a way conservatives like to gaslight people into accepting their censorship.
Climate change research is being threatened. Universities are being bullied for supporting trans athletes.
There's a reason these folks are fleeing. It's not because they can't stand to have colleagues with opposing views, it's because they are threatened. To reframe it as "diversity of thought" is disingenuous and dishonest.
ap99 · 14h ago
You're implying there was an abundance of diversity of thought before 2024 or 2016.
Was there?
Academia has been this way for decades.
kentm · 14h ago
I would argue there was. You’re using “Accepts conservative thoughts uncritically” as the barometer here. Conservative thought just tends to lose out when examined critically, so the right seeks to compensate by authoritarian measures.
See heavy handed, top down efforts to suppress climate science, gender and trans science, research into effects of diversity, etc.
saubeidl · 14h ago
So which is it now? Is it newly found diversity of thought or has it always been this way? I don't remember the last time the president bullied universities the way this one is doing, fwiw.
jklinger410 · 14h ago
> Climate change research is being threatened. Universities are being bullied for supporting trans athletes.
These two things are not equivalent.
kentm · 14h ago
They are. Transgenderism has decades of research backing it and the right has just unilaterally decided that it’s wrong. They didn’t do this based on any sort of real research but rather empty appeals to nature and essentialism.
Sports bans were not put in place because of a prevalence of trans athletes beating cis athletes.
762236 · 14h ago
Gender affirming care is unsupported by evidence, so it is inaccurate to say "unilaterally".
Trans woman tend to dominate their sports. There are so many examples of this. We don't need to have opinions on this: just use the evidence.
kentm · 13h ago
> Gender affirming care is unsupported by evidence, so it is inaccurate to say "unilaterally".
It is supported by evidence -- plenty of research around outcomes and comparisons to the alternative. The right wing does not engage with that evidence. Your denial of this is exactly an example of "unilaterally" denying it.
> Trans woman tend to dominate their sports. There are so many examples of this. We don't need to have opinions on this: just use the evidence.
There aren't, actually. You say there's so many examples but I have failed to see any of them. They tend to dig up examples where trans women just manage to place at all, usually in lower ranks. Hardly an example of domination, and even if it was its an anecdote and not statistical. In fact, the right was so desperate for examples that they leapt to conclusions at the Olympics and claimed that a cis woman was trans.
No comments yet
saubeidl · 14h ago
Why not? Both are "diversity of thought", aren't they?
sophacles · 14h ago
It's only diversity of thought if it's lockstep with thier thoughts. You know... diversity - rigid sameness.
saubeidl · 14h ago
That is exactly what I called out in my post above. "Diversity of thought" is just a mask conservatives use for "our groupthink", in my experience. Same as "freedom of speech" or "states rights".
Always only when it's convenient for them.
hollywood_court · 14h ago
Also, "thought diversity" and conservatives aren't things that typically go together.
this is completely out of touch with what's actually happening, hundreds of millions of dollars are being pulled from ongoing research that's entirely apolitical... it's a campaign of vengeance
mathiaspoint · 6h ago
It's not vengeance. Public institutions get funded by the public as long as the public feels they benefit. Many of these institutions went on a massive PR campaign demonizing the majority demographic. Regardless of whether it's actually true or not they now feel like the institutions are a net loss for them and would prefer the money is spent elsewhere.
bilbo0s · 14h ago
In fairness..
in certain ideologies, belief in scientific research and the scientific method, in and of itself, is regarded as a political ideology. Not necessarily only a scientific one.
To them, it's exclusionary to require that ideas be backed by data and replicated via peer review before being taken seriously, or even published in certain journals. Whereas to most academics the very problem are the cracks in the integrity of peer review, and the replication crisis.
It's a case of world views that are simply diametrically opposed.
Researcher are severely under paid in France (young researcher often earn barely more than the minimum wage). I doubt she will find the salary to her expectation (though the very strong worker right, and 5 weeks vacation might compensate for that).
In general, research is severely underfunded in France. That is nice that we try to make a gesture toward researcher under threat, but how many of them will we be able to keep when they realized the struggle of getting any funding for research here...
I don't know about the specific situation in France. In general, Europe spends more on academic research than the US, both in absolute terms and as a fraction of GDP. However, it's easier to make an academic career in the US. Because the gap between academic and industry salaries is wider in the US, Americans are more likely to leave the academia after PhD. And because employment-based immigration is particularly difficult in the US, many would-be immigrants end up doing a PhD without any intention of staying in the academia. Which means you have less competition if you stay in the academia in the US.
This statement appears to be incorrect.
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/w/d... has the EU at $380B
https://ncses.nsf.gov/pubs/nsf24332 has the US Fed (not state) at $880B.
> [...] the fact there's less money for research.
> An early-career biological anthropologist said she was still awaiting contract details from AMU before putting pen to paper because of salary discrepancies, though she took comfort in the fact that the cost of living is lower in France — especially considering that education for her two children, who she said were eager to settle in Marseille, would be free.
> The university’s president insisted that participants in the “Safe Place for Science” program would be paid the same wages as French researchers. The statement sought to appease concerns within France’s academic community that money would now be focused on drawing U.S. scientists whereas local researchers have long complained of insufficient funding.
> But the biological anthropologist said a more carefree life could compensate for a lower salary. "There’ll be a lot less stress as a whole, politically, academically," she reflected.
> According to the OECD, 'household disposable income is income available to households such as wages and salaries, income from self-employment and unincorporated enterprises, income from pensions and other social benefits, and income from financial investments (less any payments of tax, social insurance contributions and interest on financial liabilities). 'Gross' means that depreciation costs are not subtracted.'[1] This indicator also takes account of social transfers in kind 'such as health or education provided for free or at reduced prices by governments and not-for-profit organisations.'
United States: 62,300
France: 45,548
Americans need to be more grateful for what they have.
Money isn't everything. The french have better public transport, more social stability, a life expectancy that's higher by five (!) years etc etc.
By pretty much whatever standard you use, their quality of life is much higher.
> Disposable income is a poor metric to use though.
Hard Disagree. It's directly related to standard of living. You're also leaving out the other parts. It's adjusted for PPP, taxes, essential household costs (healthcare, shelter, etc), and social benefits.
> Money isn't everything. The french have better public transport, more social stability, a life expectancy that's higher by five (!) years etc etc.
Of course money isn't everything...but again we started off by talking about it.
> By pretty much whatever standard you use, their quality of life is much higher.
Except for household income, wealth, affordability, and others. See for yourself! This is an excellent resource: https://data-explorer.oecd.org/vis?lc=en&tm=NAAG&pg=0&snb=12...
As another random (non-definitive) data point take the homelessness rate: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/homelessn...
I stand by my statement. Too many Americans don't appreciate how good they have it. Cultural differences are real.
Because you mentioned it, I do think a lot of this comes down to cultural differences. To me (and to most Europeans!), the economic stuff just doesn't matter as much, so it's not a compelling argument to make.
I had excellent cheap pasta on a beautiful plaza in Italy yesterday, I got there via 30 euro Ryanair flight, and I booked it over my abundant PTO. At no point exploring Florence, a city of 400.000 people, did I feel unsafe at all.
That, to me, is the kind of stuff that really matters and the kind of stuff that I just can't have in the US.
It's also the kind of stuff that is hard to capture in economic stats, which is why I don't really pay as much attention to them.
I've lived in the US for almost a decade. I made a lot more money, but my life felt worse.
But maybe Americans really do just have different values and they'd rather have more money on their bank account.
I upvoted you because you argued your point well.
It's just that we're talking past each other, quality of life is so much more than that. It's the environment you live in. It's knowing that a random piece of bread you'll buy in a supermarket or in a train station will have a certain level of quality. It's cheese that doesn't taste like plastic. It's having time to spend with your loved ones. It's nobody having to worry about a medical emergency bankrupting them. It's higher education not being gated to the well-off.
Then why did you move to make more money in the US? Why are many young Europeans moving to work abroad?
People who gaslight others for chasing money, are those who already have enough money and can't empathize with those wo do not.
>I had excellent cheap pasta on a beautiful plaza in Italy yesterday, I got there via 30 euro Ryanair flight
Cherry picking personal holiday travels isn't representative of anything in this topic. Also 30 Euro flights are not the norm everywhere. You need to live in the right country/city and get lucky.
Experiences like these are just straight up impossible in the US. Believe me, I've tried. There's no nice Italian plazas anywhere and in most places in the country you wouldn't even wanna be sitting outside.
There is very few places in the US where I would like to sit outside on a plaza and have my dinner - and that is indicative of social decay and a lack of focus on building pleasant public spaces.
Europe also doesn't have grand canyons. I don't need to see a grand canyon every month though.
>- and that is indicative of social decay and a lack of focus on building pleasant public spaces.
Go to Frankfurt train station.
Feel free to address the others instead!
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Benefits are expensive, healthcare is expensive, transportation is expensive, food is expensive, and on and on. It's quite hard to just compare the US to France because of that. I think a lot of this "disposable income" relies on you being an able-bodied person of young age with zero health conditions and zero risk of emergencies. As soon as that's not the case, that "disposable" income vanishes.
I've lived in the US for a while and while I'm not incredibly wealthy, my net worth is easily in the seven figures. I ended up moving away for the above reasons.
- housing is expensive
- it's not cardboard boxes, it's tents
- you'd be mugged/knifed rather than shot, agreed
- public transportation is good when not on strike. However, it's dirty and you might get robbed
- the world's most creative government when it comes to taxes
- it's still beautiful though…
The parts of Paris I went to recently were quite nice, but of course, a tourists view is different from a locals.
I'd be surprised if it was anywhere near as bad as, say the SF tenderloin though.
Easy to high road others now, AFTER you made 7 figures in the country you now publicly despise, and wouldn't be able to where you're originally from.
Why try to emotionally pull the ladder?
> earn 40k/yr
> get taxed 30% on it
As opposed to paying more out of pocket or getting denied a claim? No thank you.
I think the University's president is being cheeky or directly obtuse. Sure, US refugee researchers will get the same wage as a French researcher, but that's poor comfort for the French researchers who would have otherwise gotten those positions.
I understand that the University is aiming at getting top researchers for peanuts which wouldn't be a bad deal for French science as a whole, but it is still a bad deal for the French science community.
Sounds like a major benefit to French researchers
But retention is also a problem. How many of those scientists will stay in Aix-Marseille? Refugees, almost by definition, go back to their country once things calm down. And life in a country where you don't speak the language is not conducive to staying there long.
I'm not saying everything will be bad - there's a plus associated to getting great minds for cheap. But if I were a French scientist fighting for grants I would definitely feel odd about my country explicitly telling me "French need not apply".
So when they eventually have the political reigns, this policy will end and these researchers will have to start over somewhere else.
Some may argue that the (former) US policy of attracting the world's best students and researchers was good for the country as a whole. Perhaps even lead to some industries being far superior to foreign competitors?
Unfortunately, those 'some' aren't currently setting policy.
Clearly professors or scholars in Women's studies / gender studies, critical race theory, and climate science are the ones worst hit by the current leadership in the US.
Source?? Here's the thing, as far as I know, women's studies/gender studies, crt, whatever... they're cheap, mostly phd students doing mass surveys of interviews or studying metadata. The expensive stuff is engineering, clinical trials, specialized equipment for labs... that stuff is also being hit.
Good riddance. The standards for scholarship in these fields are laughable; see how Affilia: Journal of Women and Social Work accepted for publication a form of Mein Kampf, rewritten to use more modern inclusive and feminist language [0] [1].
If your field of study is so epistemically bankrupt and your systems of review so defective as to not be able to identify Nazi ideology when a few words are swapped around, and to then accept those ideas for publication, it's not clear to me that you should be receiving any funding at all - particularly when it's those same fields that are so vocally and vociferously against this ideology.
[0] http://norskk.is/bytta/menn/our_struggle_is_my_struggle.pdf
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grievance_studies_affair
Was that a troll or a serious endeavor?
Because, as a troll, it's pretty funny...
This is offensive on so many levels, not least of which to history.
Various scientific research areas have also been the focus of extensive and frankly asinine criticism. Do you remember when the orange guy drew a hurricane with a sharpie? Or when he proposed nuking it? Or when various research funding was killed by DOGE, often with blatant misrepresentations of what the research was? What about the brain dead woman kept as an incubator?
Various media organisations have been sued on flimsy at best pretenses to silence them (like the CBS trial which was just settled).
If anyone is failing to see the similarities to other historical far right rises to and centralisation of power, they're lacking in knowledge on these, or stand to benefit.
As somebody who's history education was mostly centered around said beginnings, let me tell you, things sound real familiar right now, and not in a good way.
If you're interested, read this excerpt of a book based on post-war interviews with Germans about the rise of Nazism and see if any of it sounds familiar: https://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/511928.htm
That's roughly at the stages where the idiotic and fascist US administration currently is at. Ignoring the parallels serves no purpose. That's not to say they will move on the next stage (industrial extermination) like the Nazis did.
What is conservatism if not an ideology?
All you're saying is universities that align with the prevalent ideology of the authoritarian regime will be fine. Congrats, you're now the Soviet Union.
Institutions have accountability to the people. Nobody except a fringe wants universities to be maga centers, most people just want them to reflect “common sense” and forward the will of the American people
That are not desired by the public until it is. A lot of people might find research in advance and quite esoteric math useless, as it does not produce any benefit to them. That is until those research yield something that can be used in a way, or in another field, where it does impact their lives. The issue is that you cannot easily tell what is useful or not. Some research have a clear goal, who, if achieved, will yield very tangible benefit, but they might never reach it. On the other hand, something that seems impenetrable to the average man might yield incredible benefit.
Without the freedom to explore, nothing would ever be found.
I would also dispute your assertion that “no one wants universities to be maga centers.” Leaders on the right have said that they do want that, or at least the right wing American mythos to be uncritically taught and not challenged.
One things that fascists do when voted into power is assume that any random strange ideology as part of the platform is now so popular that it must override existing law and procedure, and that is exactly what Trump is doing here. Which is why these researchers are leaving. Not because they are doing something the public dislikes. The public looooves scientific research.
Education is negatively correlated with conservatism, thus a sample of a job requiring higher education will not be representative of the general public.
That is, in 19% of jobs it is an official, open requirement. It's safe to assume the unofficial discrimination is higher.
Or this one: Required ‘diversity and inclusion’ statements amount to a political litmus test for hiring - https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-universitys-new-loyalty-oat...
Or this one: Berkeley Weeded Out Job Applicants Who Didn't Propose Specific Plans To Advance Diversity - https://reason.com/2020/02/03/university-of-california-diver...
Or this one: A recent report from the Goldwater Institute found that 80% of job postings for Arizona’s public universities required applicants to submit a statement detailing their commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. - https://www.goldwaterinstitute.org/policy-report/the-new-loy...
Or how about directly from the horse's mouth: Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences Will No Longer [i.e. they did until 2024] Require Diversity Statements - https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2024/6/4/dei-faculty-hiri...
And a few more admissions of past use of these statements:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/us/diversity-statements-u...
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/06/us/politics/dei-statement...
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/us/university-of-michigan...
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/08/us/ucla-dei-statement.htm...
Oh, and just to show my statement on unofficial discrimination being higher wasn't uninformed speculation:
With State Bans on D.E.I., Some Universities Find a Workaround: Rebranding - https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/12/us/diversity-ban-dei-coll...
Gender-affirming care is not "anti-science", you just don't understand the science.
Gender-affirming care is not saying that people can change their biological sex. It was never that. That was, and will remain, a conservative hallucination.
Gender-affirming care is about curtailing the effects of gender dysphoria and improving the quality of life of transgender individuals, and some cisgender individuals. Which is science-backed. It works. Gender-affirming care leads to better outcomes for transgender individuals, period.
The problem here with you, and other's, is that you're just arguing the wrong points. You might not think gender dysphoria is real or that it matters, but that's not the conversation. The conversation is "does gender-affirming care help people and improve outcomes". Which yes, it does.
Whether those people deserve to be helped is not a scientific question. It's a political one. Please, know and understand the difference.
> I already am eating from the trashcan all the time. The name of this trashcan is ideology. The material force of ideology - makes me not see what I'm effectively eating. It's not only our reality which enslaves us. The tragedy of our predicament - when we are within ideology, is that - when we think that we escape it into our dreams - at that point we are within ideology.
No, you decided to vote republicans when you stop agreeing with some of the science.
> (conservatives actually talk with me, while liberals shun me if I ask for evidence)
https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=fr&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=tran...
Also, America is not 50% conservative. The split is more like thirds, i.e. America is non-binary
Well sure, but you're missing a very key component here: conservatives are ideologically opposed to education, especially public education. It's a foundational part of American conservative ideology.
Yeah, that influences things.
i.e. If I accept and employ a conservative person then I'm aligning with conservative values and betraying liberal values.
What the GP is proposing is abandoning this black and white thinking, or in other words: accepting diversity of thought.
(Waiting for downvotes from the HN echo chamber that abhors diversity of thought.)
Climate change research is being threatened. Universities are being bullied for supporting trans athletes.
There's a reason these folks are fleeing. It's not because they can't stand to have colleagues with opposing views, it's because they are threatened. To reframe it as "diversity of thought" is disingenuous and dishonest.
Was there?
Academia has been this way for decades.
See heavy handed, top down efforts to suppress climate science, gender and trans science, research into effects of diversity, etc.
These two things are not equivalent.
Sports bans were not put in place because of a prevalence of trans athletes beating cis athletes.
Trans woman tend to dominate their sports. There are so many examples of this. We don't need to have opinions on this: just use the evidence.
It is supported by evidence -- plenty of research around outcomes and comparisons to the alternative. The right wing does not engage with that evidence. Your denial of this is exactly an example of "unilaterally" denying it.
> Trans woman tend to dominate their sports. There are so many examples of this. We don't need to have opinions on this: just use the evidence.
There aren't, actually. You say there's so many examples but I have failed to see any of them. They tend to dig up examples where trans women just manage to place at all, usually in lower ranks. Hardly an example of domination, and even if it was its an anecdote and not statistical. In fact, the right was so desperate for examples that they leapt to conclusions at the Olympics and claimed that a cis woman was trans.
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Always only when it's convenient for them.
in certain ideologies, belief in scientific research and the scientific method, in and of itself, is regarded as a political ideology. Not necessarily only a scientific one.
To them, it's exclusionary to require that ideas be backed by data and replicated via peer review before being taken seriously, or even published in certain journals. Whereas to most academics the very problem are the cracks in the integrity of peer review, and the replication crisis.
It's a case of world views that are simply diametrically opposed.