6d ago

As Trump Administration Cuts Funding, Researchers Turn to European Universities

www.nytimes.com

Just hours after opening its new program for American researchers called Safe Place For Science in reaction to Trump administration policies, Aix Marseille University received its first application.

Since then, the university in the south of France known for its science programs, has received about a dozen applications per day from what the school considers “scientific asylum” seekers.

Other universities in France and elsewhere in Europe have also rushed to save American researchers fleeing drastic cuts to jobs and programs by the Trump administration, as well as perceived attacks on whole fields of research.

At stake are not just individual jobs, but the concept of free scientific inquiry, university presidents say. They are also rushing to fill huge holes in collective research caused by the cuts, particularly in areas targeted by the Trump administration, including studies of climate change, public health, environmental science, gender and diversity.

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3 comments

The follow-on effect to all the headlines of what’s being cut is going to decimate some pretty important corners of the US economy. We’re all watching a country die here.
- Or shift into something else ?
  
  That probably works for some people. But, look at the departments that were cut:
  Firings at U.S. centers deemed the pinnacle of science have been announced week after week including at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Geological Survey and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
  Like, okay. I can believe that the CDC people may very well have a skillset in demand in the medical industry, say. Depending upon what they specialize in, there are probably places in private industry that could use knowledge from some of the people at the USGS, like oil or gas extraction.
  But how many non-governmental places want the NOAA people? Weather forecasting companies, maybe? Not that many of those.
  I mean, the problem is that if you're doing work on climate change, you're banging on a public good. And generally-speaking, private industry doesn't address public goods, because they can't make a return doing it. You'd have to have government hire them, and at that point, might as well just make them part of government.
  EDIT: Honestly, realistically the best way to fund climate change work would be through a global fund, with everyone pitching something in, because it's pretty much everyone being impacted.