I skimmed what I could until the paywall. The question seems well written. My problem is one of scale. There are so many levels to emigrating. Will these scientists : « consider » leaving if...
I skimmed what I could until the paywall. The question seems well written. My problem is one of scale. There are so many levels to emigrating. Will these scientists :
« consider » leaving if someone walked into their house and handed them a work visa
Would like to leave, and at some point may start working towards that
Are actively searching for opportunities in other countries and know the immigration laws of their target country
Have reasonable opportunities accepted and are working towards a work visa
Have all the paperwork complete, and are about to leave
There is so much time, effort, and paperwork between those steps. Wanting to leave is very different from will leave. I started wanting to leave near the beginning of the first Trump presidency. I am only now in a foreign country on a student visa, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to stay. It will likely me easier for scientists to emigrate than it is for me, but this doesn’t happen overnight (except for the rich and powerful).
It doesn't look like the poll differentiated between those, but absolutely answering yes to "Are you a US researcher who is considering leaving the country following the disruptions to science...
It doesn't look like the poll differentiated between those, but absolutely answering yes to "Are you a US researcher who is considering leaving the country following the disruptions to science prompted by the Trump administration?" could mean anything. They also note that it's a self selected group, so it's almost certainly biased toward people with strong feelings in the affirmative. Still, it's probably indicative of a broad attitude and 75.3% responding yes is pretty wild.
There are a few quotes worth highlighting:
Institutions outside the United States are taking advantage of the Trump turmoil, the researcher says. “From what I’m hearing from the places we’re talking to, and other people who are looking to take international jobs, a lot of universities in these countries are seeing this as a once-in-a-generation opportunity,” he says. “I think it has gone from ‘Can we recruit a few people?’ to ‘How many people can we actually take?’ — because the demand is there.”
...
Another respondent is actively applying only to positions in Europe: “I am transgender, and the 1–2 punch makes it improbable that the life I want to live is a viable option in this country.”
—————————
Scientists are already well positioned for being able to move internationally (speaking from personal experience) since academic research is very specialized, the professional community is global, and even small universities and research institutes tend to have the infrastructure to sponsor work visas in a way that private companies are hesitant to.
In a related article, it's reported that the EU is actively encouraging member nations to recruit from the US:
...the European Research Council is planning on doubling the amount of money it offers grantees relocating to the EU, to a maximum of €2 million (US$2.2 million) each.
...
The Netherlands’ government has asked its national research-funding council to establish a fund to attract top scientists who are looking to move because of the changing geopolitical climate. Universities in Belgium and France have advertised specific opportunities for US researchers.
The director of research where I work (not in the US) recently told me he was pushing the board to try to find ways to recruit from the US.
It won't be a 75% loss, but I expect that the flow of researchers between the US and other countries will see a pretty dramatic shift over the coming few years. Add to that the realization that the international community can't rely on US data products and things will likely look very different in a decade.
Fwiw, I think a big thing you're overlooking in this is the relative ease with which scientists can emigrate (especially those in the fields that tend to get published in Nature). They're...
Fwiw, I think a big thing you're overlooking in this is the relative ease with which scientists can emigrate (especially those in the fields that tend to get published in Nature). They're in-demand highly educated workers that would almost certainly be able to get decent-paying jobs and visas in other countries. So while you're right that there are differences in the level of motivation that aren't delineated here, I think the baseline "would you consider leaving the US?" is a bigger deal for this population than it is if you did a similar survey of average people on the street.
Very much this. On top of that, unless I'm misunderstanding the definition the poll was using, a good number of the US scientists who responded are going to be people who already have passports or...
Very much this. On top of that, unless I'm misunderstanding the definition the poll was using, a good number of the US scientists who responded are going to be people who already have passports or citizenship in other countries and came to the US in the first place for all those reasons you rightly gave around mobility - it's a way more international group than average, and the US was a huge draw for jobs, funding, and opportunities.
A lot of researchers and academics living in the US could leave tomorrow if they wanted and go back to live with family while they figure out the next step - no visas, no paperwork, just a plane ticket. Since those are also the people who've seen news about friends and colleagues getting disappeared by (presumed) ICE agents into unmarked vans, I'd suggest they're even more likely than you were thinking to be serious about those plans to leave.
Depending on the country, one might not even need to be a scientist. In some places simply having demonstrable STEM-adjacent skills/experience and holding a bachelor’s (not necessarily related to...
Depending on the country, one might not even need to be a scientist. In some places simply having demonstrable STEM-adjacent skills/experience and holding a bachelor’s (not necessarily related to your field) will not only increase one’s chances of getting a visa but also expedite the permanent residency process.
It’s only that much easier for those with highly specialized fields of study coming from prestigious universities. Every country wants more smart people.
Oh absolutely, I myself am able to look for work in English largely because it's in that technical domain, despite not being a scientist. But I think scientists/academics are uniquely a population...
Oh absolutely, I myself am able to look for work in English largely because it's in that technical domain, despite not being a scientist. But I think scientists/academics are uniquely a population made up more or less exclusively of people who meet those criteria.
Yeah most people who talk about leaving any country do not understand the actual process involved in doing so. Especially to the countries they think they'd be going to. Immigration is a big deal...
Yeah most people who talk about leaving any country do not understand the actual process involved in doing so. Especially to the countries they think they'd be going to. Immigration is a big deal all over the world, and its not as easy as just taking a vacation and staying.
The idea that someone "considered" it doesn't really mean much without a lot more context.
My question is will the other countries actually welcome us with open arms ? I know that things are changing, but in my experience for the last decade+, scientific exchange was extremely...
My question is will the other countries actually welcome us with open arms ? I know that things are changing, but in my experience for the last decade+, scientific exchange was extremely one-sided, with a huge proportion of domestic labs being staffed by foreign scientists, but I rarely, if ever, heard of American scientists going abroad for anything outside of possibly schooling or some fellowships(aka, temporary positions only). It is rare for people from the USA to post-doc or go to university, get a professor position, or become staff scientists/technicians outside of the USA.
I always felt it was a bit unfair for so many foreign scientists to come to the USA and get educated or do their post docs, then go back to their home countries to become professors or whatever other final position they wanted. Like the USA was just a stepping stone. Or the USA was just a place to use the facilities and resources to get published.
I really hope truly other countries will take the opportunity to welcome us - both to preserve and encourage our own scientists, but also gain highly motivated citizens that are aligned with a culture and society that appreciates them. It’s one thing to get scientists at any other time outside of a political revolution, but another when they leave during that time. It is a more permanent commitment. It is an alignment of values that is harder to suss out otherwise.
PS, the fact that Nature paywalled this confirms one of the many reasons I left science lol. If this behemoth of uselessness cannot be reformed…I just can’t with this field…
I'm an American scientist doing a postdoc abroad (Germany). I think these positions have always been available for Americans who choose to pursue them; they just generally choose not to. Within...
I'm an American scientist doing a postdoc abroad (Germany).
I think these positions have always been available for Americans who choose to pursue them; they just generally choose not to. Within Europe it's much more common for people to venture outside their home country for graduate studies/postdocs/permanent positions. (In my current research group, we have a single German postdoc versus four non-German postdocs.) But this arrangement mostly comes from necessity: if America has dozens of good labs for a specific research topic, the typical European country might have only two or three. It's only by taking Europe as a whole that you get something comparable to America's research output.
So yes, an American scientist could roughly double their career options by applying for positions abroad. (And frankly, if you're an American scientist who's ever fancied the idea of living abroad, I'd recommend taking the opportunity.) But living abroad is hard, the difficulty of which I don't think anyone can fully appreciate until they've experienced it themselves. Imagine yourself embedded in an unfamiliar language and culture, separated by friends and family by thousands of miles away, all while having to navigate foreign bureaucracies, housing markets, telephone contracts, etc. None of this is conducive to doing research. Why subject yourself to that when there are options at home?
Thank you for the insight ! The language barrier has always been tough for me. While “Science” is conducted in English, I believe your day to day lab life would be conducted in the native...
Thank you for the insight !
The language barrier has always been tough for me. While “Science” is conducted in English, I believe your day to day lab life would be conducted in the native language, which I think is fair. Is the lab conducted in English ?
I have moved across the world and across the country a couple times now, so I believe in my own adaptability. But I struggle with the hyper competitiveness for limited positions abroad.
Yup, generally all meetings are held in English -- there was no additional language requirement for my contract. I only ever hear German in the office when Germans are conversing among themselves,...
Yup, generally all meetings are held in English -- there was no additional language requirement for my contract. I only ever hear German in the office when Germans are conversing among themselves, but even then they will switch to English if I join them.
That said, I did hear of one research group (with foreign students/postdocs) that insisted in holding all of their group meetings in German. That struck me as pretty shitty but also atypical.
This was my experience in Switzerland. Everything above undergraduate level was in English and even the undergraduate courses were typically taught in English, though students usually had the...
This was my experience in Switzerland. Everything above undergraduate level was in English and even the undergraduate courses were typically taught in English, though students usually had the option of submitting assignments in either English or French.
Life outside work, on the other hand, definitely required relearning French.
How much English vs. German is used depends heavily on what field you're in and what level you're at, in my experience. In STEM subjects it'll often be English in the lab once you're at or above...
How much English vs. German is used depends heavily on what field you're in and what level you're at, in my experience. In STEM subjects it'll often be English in the lab once you're at or above the graduate level, but it's not a guarantee. At the bachelor's level, almost no courses even in STEM will be in English. There are probably a few, but they're extremely rare. And work in the humanities or social sciences uses German.
I’ve lived and studied in both the US and UK, and that imbalance doesn’t really mirror my experience - admittedly I’ve been in the private sector for a good few years now, but my friends still in...
I’ve lived and studied in both the US and UK, and that imbalance doesn’t really mirror my experience - admittedly I’ve been in the private sector for a good few years now, but my friends still in academia are a pretty wide spectrum in terms of where they came from and where they chose to settle, and that seems fairly normal from what I see. I haven’t noticed an especially heavy bias towards or away from the US either way. I do know a few who did choose to settle there with the intention of staying long term and are now rethinking that, of course…
Admittedly I am one of those people who came, stayed for a bit, and left - but I don’t personally see it as a bad thing, either when I did it in the US or when others do it in the UK. I kept close ties, I was back multiple times a year most years since I moved, and moving back to the US more permanently was always a serious option in my mind. I took the Trump election pretty hard for a lot of reasons, but one of the most straightforward was because it’s wiped out that whole tree of possible choices for my future.
This whole topic piqued my curiosity so I went looking for some numbers, and it looks like about 6% of students in US higher education are international. I couldn’t immediately see numbers for faculty, but I guess students are more relevant if you’re thinking of people who come for a relatively short period of time?
For comparison, in the UK it’s 26% of students, and if you look at postgrads alone it jumps to 52% - I didn’t realise the numbers were that high, and honestly my immediate reaction to it is pride. The UK has some amazing universities with amazing people working in them, a handful of whom are my close friends; as far as I’m concerned, letting people come to learn from them and then spread that knowledge back across the world is the best setup we could ask for.
This is very much not the case in my experience, though I suspect it may be field-dependent. In the field I almost went into, it's much easier to find post-doc positions in Europe than in the US,...
It is rare for people from the USA to post-doc or go to university, get a professor position, or become staff scientists/technicians outside of the USA.
This is very much not the case in my experience, though I suspect it may be field-dependent. In the field I almost went into, it's much easier to find post-doc positions in Europe than in the US, and many Americans would thus do post-docs in Europe even when they planned on returning to the US long-term later. Americans working in industry as scientists or technicians is very common in my experience, and while positions at universities are less common, that tends to reflect the size of the market compared to indistry more than any particular lack of Americans relative to others.
I also find that, when there is an imbalance, as there is with attending university, it's very heavily influenced by the language barrier, at least in some countries. There are simply way fewer Americans who are bilingual with enough fluency to do academic work (as a student or teacher) in a non-English language, whereas fluency in English is absolutely par for the course among Europeans with sufficient education to be scientists.
I skimmed what I could until the paywall. The question seems well written. My problem is one of scale. There are so many levels to emigrating. Will these scientists :
There is so much time, effort, and paperwork between those steps. Wanting to leave is very different from will leave. I started wanting to leave near the beginning of the first Trump presidency. I am only now in a foreign country on a student visa, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to stay. It will likely me easier for scientists to emigrate than it is for me, but this doesn’t happen overnight (except for the rich and powerful).
It doesn't look like the poll differentiated between those, but absolutely answering yes to "Are you a US researcher who is considering leaving the country following the disruptions to science prompted by the Trump administration?" could mean anything. They also note that it's a self selected group, so it's almost certainly biased toward people with strong feelings in the affirmative. Still, it's probably indicative of a broad attitude and 75.3% responding yes is pretty wild.
There are a few quotes worth highlighting:
...
—————————
Scientists are already well positioned for being able to move internationally (speaking from personal experience) since academic research is very specialized, the professional community is global, and even small universities and research institutes tend to have the infrastructure to sponsor work visas in a way that private companies are hesitant to.
In a related article, it's reported that the EU is actively encouraging member nations to recruit from the US:
...
The director of research where I work (not in the US) recently told me he was pushing the board to try to find ways to recruit from the US.
It won't be a 75% loss, but I expect that the flow of researchers between the US and other countries will see a pretty dramatic shift over the coming few years. Add to that the realization that the international community can't rely on US data products and things will likely look very different in a decade.
Fwiw, I think a big thing you're overlooking in this is the relative ease with which scientists can emigrate (especially those in the fields that tend to get published in Nature). They're in-demand highly educated workers that would almost certainly be able to get decent-paying jobs and visas in other countries. So while you're right that there are differences in the level of motivation that aren't delineated here, I think the baseline "would you consider leaving the US?" is a bigger deal for this population than it is if you did a similar survey of average people on the street.
Very much this. On top of that, unless I'm misunderstanding the definition the poll was using, a good number of the US scientists who responded are going to be people who already have passports or citizenship in other countries and came to the US in the first place for all those reasons you rightly gave around mobility - it's a way more international group than average, and the US was a huge draw for jobs, funding, and opportunities.
A lot of researchers and academics living in the US could leave tomorrow if they wanted and go back to live with family while they figure out the next step - no visas, no paperwork, just a plane ticket. Since those are also the people who've seen news about friends and colleagues getting disappeared by (presumed) ICE agents into unmarked vans, I'd suggest they're even more likely than you were thinking to be serious about those plans to leave.
Depending on the country, one might not even need to be a scientist. In some places simply having demonstrable STEM-adjacent skills/experience and holding a bachelor’s (not necessarily related to your field) will not only increase one’s chances of getting a visa but also expedite the permanent residency process.
It’s only that much easier for those with highly specialized fields of study coming from prestigious universities. Every country wants more smart people.
Oh absolutely, I myself am able to look for work in English largely because it's in that technical domain, despite not being a scientist. But I think scientists/academics are uniquely a population made up more or less exclusively of people who meet those criteria.
Yeah most people who talk about leaving any country do not understand the actual process involved in doing so. Especially to the countries they think they'd be going to. Immigration is a big deal all over the world, and its not as easy as just taking a vacation and staying.
The idea that someone "considered" it doesn't really mean much without a lot more context.
My question is will the other countries actually welcome us with open arms ? I know that things are changing, but in my experience for the last decade+, scientific exchange was extremely one-sided, with a huge proportion of domestic labs being staffed by foreign scientists, but I rarely, if ever, heard of American scientists going abroad for anything outside of possibly schooling or some fellowships(aka, temporary positions only). It is rare for people from the USA to post-doc or go to university, get a professor position, or become staff scientists/technicians outside of the USA.
I always felt it was a bit unfair for so many foreign scientists to come to the USA and get educated or do their post docs, then go back to their home countries to become professors or whatever other final position they wanted. Like the USA was just a stepping stone. Or the USA was just a place to use the facilities and resources to get published.
I really hope truly other countries will take the opportunity to welcome us - both to preserve and encourage our own scientists, but also gain highly motivated citizens that are aligned with a culture and society that appreciates them. It’s one thing to get scientists at any other time outside of a political revolution, but another when they leave during that time. It is a more permanent commitment. It is an alignment of values that is harder to suss out otherwise.
PS, the fact that Nature paywalled this confirms one of the many reasons I left science lol. If this behemoth of uselessness cannot be reformed…I just can’t with this field…
I'm an American scientist doing a postdoc abroad (Germany).
I think these positions have always been available for Americans who choose to pursue them; they just generally choose not to. Within Europe it's much more common for people to venture outside their home country for graduate studies/postdocs/permanent positions. (In my current research group, we have a single German postdoc versus four non-German postdocs.) But this arrangement mostly comes from necessity: if America has dozens of good labs for a specific research topic, the typical European country might have only two or three. It's only by taking Europe as a whole that you get something comparable to America's research output.
So yes, an American scientist could roughly double their career options by applying for positions abroad. (And frankly, if you're an American scientist who's ever fancied the idea of living abroad, I'd recommend taking the opportunity.) But living abroad is hard, the difficulty of which I don't think anyone can fully appreciate until they've experienced it themselves. Imagine yourself embedded in an unfamiliar language and culture, separated by friends and family by thousands of miles away, all while having to navigate foreign bureaucracies, housing markets, telephone contracts, etc. None of this is conducive to doing research. Why subject yourself to that when there are options at home?
Thank you for the insight !
The language barrier has always been tough for me. While “Science” is conducted in English, I believe your day to day lab life would be conducted in the native language, which I think is fair. Is the lab conducted in English ?
I have moved across the world and across the country a couple times now, so I believe in my own adaptability. But I struggle with the hyper competitiveness for limited positions abroad.
Yup, generally all meetings are held in English -- there was no additional language requirement for my contract. I only ever hear German in the office when Germans are conversing among themselves, but even then they will switch to English if I join them.
That said, I did hear of one research group (with foreign students/postdocs) that insisted in holding all of their group meetings in German. That struck me as pretty shitty but also atypical.
This was my experience in Switzerland. Everything above undergraduate level was in English and even the undergraduate courses were typically taught in English, though students usually had the option of submitting assignments in either English or French.
Life outside work, on the other hand, definitely required relearning French.
Yeah, even if one can work in English, longer term you will inevitably feel pretty isolated without learning the local language for day-to-day life.
How much English vs. German is used depends heavily on what field you're in and what level you're at, in my experience. In STEM subjects it'll often be English in the lab once you're at or above the graduate level, but it's not a guarantee. At the bachelor's level, almost no courses even in STEM will be in English. There are probably a few, but they're extremely rare. And work in the humanities or social sciences uses German.
I’ve lived and studied in both the US and UK, and that imbalance doesn’t really mirror my experience - admittedly I’ve been in the private sector for a good few years now, but my friends still in academia are a pretty wide spectrum in terms of where they came from and where they chose to settle, and that seems fairly normal from what I see. I haven’t noticed an especially heavy bias towards or away from the US either way. I do know a few who did choose to settle there with the intention of staying long term and are now rethinking that, of course…
Admittedly I am one of those people who came, stayed for a bit, and left - but I don’t personally see it as a bad thing, either when I did it in the US or when others do it in the UK. I kept close ties, I was back multiple times a year most years since I moved, and moving back to the US more permanently was always a serious option in my mind. I took the Trump election pretty hard for a lot of reasons, but one of the most straightforward was because it’s wiped out that whole tree of possible choices for my future.
This whole topic piqued my curiosity so I went looking for some numbers, and it looks like about 6% of students in US higher education are international. I couldn’t immediately see numbers for faculty, but I guess students are more relevant if you’re thinking of people who come for a relatively short period of time?
For comparison, in the UK it’s 26% of students, and if you look at postgrads alone it jumps to 52% - I didn’t realise the numbers were that high, and honestly my immediate reaction to it is pride. The UK has some amazing universities with amazing people working in them, a handful of whom are my close friends; as far as I’m concerned, letting people come to learn from them and then spread that knowledge back across the world is the best setup we could ask for.
[Edit] clarity
This is very much not the case in my experience, though I suspect it may be field-dependent. In the field I almost went into, it's much easier to find post-doc positions in Europe than in the US, and many Americans would thus do post-docs in Europe even when they planned on returning to the US long-term later. Americans working in industry as scientists or technicians is very common in my experience, and while positions at universities are less common, that tends to reflect the size of the market compared to indistry more than any particular lack of Americans relative to others.
I also find that, when there is an imbalance, as there is with attending university, it's very heavily influenced by the language barrier, at least in some countries. There are simply way fewer Americans who are bilingual with enough fluency to do academic work (as a student or teacher) in a non-English language, whereas fluency in English is absolutely par for the course among Europeans with sufficient education to be scientists.