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A more radical solution: Basic income for all researchers and provide efficient digital way to see how funds are being spent like open collective for open sourc

A more radical solution: Basic income for all researchers and provide efficient digital way to see how funds are being spent like open collective for open source. Most problems arise at an individual level where people don't get paid unless they are putting research papers on the new hype thing and the other is expenditure on middlemen and bureaucracy which isn't easily visible. Eliminate the use of research grants for funding people's living. Bit pedantic but you should use they instead of he/she. People can have other pronouns.

kebman 6y ago
Oh, you mean tenure? UBI is a general thing for the whole population, and not something just for scientists. Tenure is in general a good, as long as scientists keep working, and there are some controls keeping them producing at least "something". And let's face it, most of them do. This is great, because it releaves scientists of pressure, which means more of them can be creative in their research, which actually speeds up discoveries. This is also a valid approach within tech and IT btw. But it should be said that it has a very poor track record outside of these knowledge-heavy professions. On the other hand, if you really think UBI is a good solution, then I'm afraid you don't know how an economy really works.
- searchableguy 6y ago
  Yeah, I meant something like tenure but less restricted for anyone doing research. > On the other hand, if you really think UBI is a good solution, then I'm afraid you don't know how an economy really works. Could you elaborate more?
  - kebman 6y ago
    It has been discussed to death, but for the sake of argument, let's review these two completely opposing factions, who both agree that UBI doesn't work: Zero Hedge on why UBI doesn't work: https://safehaven.com/markets/economy/Why-Universal-Basic-Income-Wont-Work.html https://safehaven.com/markets/economy/Why-Universal-Basic-In... The Guardian on why UBI doesn't work: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/06/universal-basic-income-public-realm-poverty-inequality https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/06/univer...
    - cousin_it 6y ago
      Your second link mentions "universal basic services", I always supported that idea but didn't know it had a name. It's better than UBI because it sidesteps the problem of cost disease (landlords raising rents in response, etc).
      - kebman 6y ago
        Why not go for the original idea, and go straight for Communism instead?
- mattkrause 6y ago
  I think they mean something like UBI: non- or less-competitive grants that would fund modest-sized projects (or pilot studies for larger ones). Tenure doesn't really help with this problem in the lab sciences. While it lets faculty members keep their jobs, it usually doesn't come with enough funding to do experimental work. In fact, while you can "keep" a tenured position without grants, many places find ways to...discourage that (move your office to a shoebox in the sub-basement, crappy teaching and service assignments).
gen155954609803 6y ago
>Bit pedantic but you should use they instead of he/she. People can have other pronouns. One of those other pronouns is literally "they", so you're still risking using the wrong pronoun by using "they" for someone who prefers to be referred to as "he". Was anyone else taught the rule that when writing about a third-party whose gender is unknown, use your own pronouns?
0d9eooo 6y ago
IIRC, Hungary has implemented something like this and it's been floated as an idea, to distribute grant dollars as a fixed amount to everyone who has an H index or citation count above a certain amount. When I've talked about this with colleagues, they've argued this would make problems worse, and it might, but I think the idea was more that once you reach a certain threshold you should be funded some amount. Of course, I'd argue that this is basically the idea behind tenure at an R1 institution, that once you reach a certain level the state or private board of trustees is paying your salary to do research. But nowadays tenure at an R1 institution is proxy for external grant dollars, which defeats the purpose and is redundant. The real problem is indirect funds, which create profit for institutions. The federal government needs to eliminate indirect funds, so that grant dollars aren't perversely incentivised and tenure is based on research quality rather than profit.

kebman 6y ago

Oh, you mean tenure? UBI is a general thing for the whole population, and not something just for scientists. Tenure is in general a good, as long as scientists keep working, and there are some controls keeping them producing at least "something". And let's face it, most of them do. This is great, because it releaves scientists of pressure, which means more of them can be creative in their research, which actually speeds up discoveries. This is also a valid approach within tech and IT btw. But it should be said that it has a very poor track record outside of these knowledge-heavy professions. On the other hand, if you really think UBI is a good solution, then I'm afraid you don't know how an economy really works.

searchableguy 6y ago
Yeah, I meant something like tenure but less restricted for anyone doing research. > On the other hand, if you really think UBI is a good solution, then I'm afraid you don't know how an economy really works. Could you elaborate more?
- kebman 6y ago
  It has been discussed to death, but for the sake of argument, let's review these two completely opposing factions, who both agree that UBI doesn't work: Zero Hedge on why UBI doesn't work: https://safehaven.com/markets/economy/Why-Universal-Basic-Income-Wont-Work.html https://safehaven.com/markets/economy/Why-Universal-Basic-In... The Guardian on why UBI doesn't work: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/06/universal-basic-income-public-realm-poverty-inequality https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/may/06/univer...
  - cousin_it 6y ago
    Your second link mentions "universal basic services", I always supported that idea but didn't know it had a name. It's better than UBI because it sidesteps the problem of cost disease (landlords raising rents in response, etc).
    - kebman 6y ago
      Why not go for the original idea, and go straight for Communism instead?
mattkrause 6y ago
I think they mean something like UBI: non- or less-competitive grants that would fund modest-sized projects (or pilot studies for larger ones). Tenure doesn't really help with this problem in the lab sciences. While it lets faculty members keep their jobs, it usually doesn't come with enough funding to do experimental work. In fact, while you can "keep" a tenured position without grants, many places find ways to...discourage that (move your office to a shoebox in the sub-basement, crappy teaching and service assignments).

gen155954609803 6y ago

>Bit pedantic but you should use they instead of he/she. People can have other pronouns. One of those other pronouns is literally "they", so you're still risking using the wrong pronoun by using "they" for someone who prefers to be referred to as "he". Was anyone else taught the rule that when writing about a third-party whose gender is unknown, use your own pronouns?

0d9eooo 6y ago

IIRC, Hungary has implemented something like this and it's been floated as an idea, to distribute grant dollars as a fixed amount to everyone who has an H index or citation count above a certain amount. When I've talked about this with colleagues, they've argued this would make problems worse, and it might, but I think the idea was more that once you reach a certain threshold you should be funded some amount. Of course, I'd argue that this is basically the idea behind tenure at an R1 institution, that once you reach a certain level the state or private board of trustees is paying your salary to do research. But nowadays tenure at an R1 institution is proxy for external grant dollars, which defeats the purpose and is redundant. The real problem is indirect funds, which create profit for institutions. The federal government needs to eliminate indirect funds, so that grant dollars aren't perversely incentivised and tenure is based on research quality rather than profit.