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I recently spent about a month total in Cambridge and Oxford, just as a remote worker / tourist. Having previously visited Harvard, Yale, MIT, Princeton, etc. i

I recently spent about a month total in Cambridge and Oxford, just as a remote worker / tourist. Having previously visited Harvard, Yale, MIT, Princeton, etc. it was my impression that American universities have an order of magnitude more resources than UK ones. Even an average state school campus in the US appears larger and better funded. Of course, Oxford and Cambridge have a centuries-old historical legacy (and are both absolutely worth visiting, although I much preferred Cambridge) but they seemed more dependent on that traditional reputation. So if the “brand” of the UK goes down, it will have a direct effect on the top universities in a way that I don’t think would happen in the US.

was_a_dev 3y ago
From a UK perspective, the US "throws money" at everything, both culturally and because you are a larger economy. Education, sports, healthcare, industry, space, science to name a few. The UK also has an opposing culture, we don't invest in the long term in infrastructure or people. Even in your case, you visited the two richest universities (by a long margin) in the UK.
- okeuro49 3y ago
  There's long term investment in London, but the North never recovered after losing its industry. Numerous promises such as "northern powerhouse" have failed to materialise.
  - was_a_dev 3y ago
    I think it would be safe to call London an outlier for the UK, for the reason of how much investment is directed there
  - kranke155 3y ago
    The north didn’t “lose” its industry, im afraid. It was deliberately destroyed as a matter of policy. Deindustrialisation is terrible.
  - thebruce87m 3y ago
    For people outside the UK - English people refer to the north of England as “the North”, even when talking in the context of the UK.
- eli_gottlieb 3y ago
  > The UK also has an opposing culture, we don't invest in the long term in infrastructure or people. That's not really so different from the United States!
inglor_cz 3y ago
While good amenities may matter for certain types of research (biotech), what about disciplines such as maths, which require good thinking, a piece of paper to draw on, and that's about it? If you look at the results of the International Mathematical Olympiad, many of the really successful countries (Russia, Hungary, Romania, Iran) aren't very rich. A possible explanation would be brain-drain: talented mathematicians leaving too-poor Oxford for better pay in the US. Does that happen?
- pmyteh 3y ago
  Academic pay is vastly higher in comparable US institutions, and it's fairly easy to get a work visa as an academic. The brain drain is probably weaker than you would expect because so few of us went into academia for the money, but I definitely know of talented people who have left Oxford for the US with money as one of the key reasons.
- keiferski 3y ago
  I think the number of purely mental fields is fairly small, especially in technology. More than that, though, are how amenities affect future applicants. If I was a prospective student choosing between Oxford and say, Princeton, the quality of the campus and amount of resources available would affect my decision. My impression was that Oxbridge is very much about maintaining and continuing the traditions of the UK more than anything else.
  - Symbiote 3y ago
    As a tourist in Oxford or Princeton, how can you tell what resources are available?
    - keiferski 3y ago
      Of course, a lot of things are not accessible to tourists. But it’s fairly easy to see inside most buildings and generally just tell that e.g. the library is smaller or that the department of X is in a 8-story modern building vs. a 2-story old one. That doesn’t always correlate to “resources available” but as another commenter put it, American universities are practically small city-states.
lm28469 3y ago
US campuses are mini cities with large amount of money spent on a lot of useless things Europe campuses are buildings with just a bit more than the bare minimum you need to do the job
joshvm 3y ago
University funding varies wildly in the UK and it mostly correlates with ranking, at least the 'higher-up' universities generally have more disposal income to give to researchers. Unfortunately, it's a vicious circle because it's the difference between "you can go to this conference" or "we'll pay the article fee" and "we have no money, sorry". Allowing researchers those sorts of freedoms means you tend to get better researchers who can pump out more research with higher visibility. Oxford University owns pretty much the entire historic town centre, so they're sitting on a lot of assets that aren't obviously visible (beyond the colleges). UK universities have generally very good staff benefits. 30-35 days of leave is not uncommon, on top of public holidays and the usual academia "if nobody notices" flexitime attitude. Pay is probably a little better than the US when you compare cost of living. The US has notoriously poor PhD and Postdoc salaries and several big universities have had strike action against them. Don't confuse US institutional endowment with what trickles down to researchers. The US does have per-diem though, which is a fantastic source of beer money when traveling. UK universities are almost always penny-pinchers for staff expenses.
- rcarr 3y ago
  > University funding varies wildly in the UK and it mostly correlates with ranking, at least the 'higher-up' universities generally have more disposal income to give to researchers. This is how the entirety of the UK works. All the funding goes to London, everywhere else gets nothing. All the laws are written to benefit the landlord and investor classes, everyone else gets nothing etc. Little recognition that the entire nation is meant to be one big tribe, barely any redistribution or attempts to raise up the failing parts. In my opinion, the ruling classes have never really abandoned their colonial mindset, and now their overseas power has waned they treat the rest of the UK as a colony of the City and Westminster.
  - gmt2027 3y ago
    I completely agree about the colonial mindset and an inherent bias towards self-perpetuating elitism in the UK.
    - 3y ago

was_a_dev 3y ago

From a UK perspective, the US "throws money" at everything, both culturally and because you are a larger economy. Education, sports, healthcare, industry, space, science to name a few. The UK also has an opposing culture, we don't invest in the long term in infrastructure or people. Even in your case, you visited the two richest universities (by a long margin) in the UK.

okeuro49 3y ago
There's long term investment in London, but the North never recovered after losing its industry. Numerous promises such as "northern powerhouse" have failed to materialise.
- was_a_dev 3y ago
  I think it would be safe to call London an outlier for the UK, for the reason of how much investment is directed there
- kranke155 3y ago
  The north didn’t “lose” its industry, im afraid. It was deliberately destroyed as a matter of policy. Deindustrialisation is terrible.
- thebruce87m 3y ago
  For people outside the UK - English people refer to the north of England as “the North”, even when talking in the context of the UK.
eli_gottlieb 3y ago
> The UK also has an opposing culture, we don't invest in the long term in infrastructure or people. That's not really so different from the United States!

inglor_cz 3y ago

While good amenities may matter for certain types of research (biotech), what about disciplines such as maths, which require good thinking, a piece of paper to draw on, and that's about it? If you look at the results of the International Mathematical Olympiad, many of the really successful countries (Russia, Hungary, Romania, Iran) aren't very rich. A possible explanation would be brain-drain: talented mathematicians leaving too-poor Oxford for better pay in the US. Does that happen?

pmyteh 3y ago
Academic pay is vastly higher in comparable US institutions, and it's fairly easy to get a work visa as an academic. The brain drain is probably weaker than you would expect because so few of us went into academia for the money, but I definitely know of talented people who have left Oxford for the US with money as one of the key reasons.
keiferski 3y ago
I think the number of purely mental fields is fairly small, especially in technology. More than that, though, are how amenities affect future applicants. If I was a prospective student choosing between Oxford and say, Princeton, the quality of the campus and amount of resources available would affect my decision. My impression was that Oxbridge is very much about maintaining and continuing the traditions of the UK more than anything else.
- Symbiote 3y ago
  As a tourist in Oxford or Princeton, how can you tell what resources are available?
  - keiferski 3y ago
    Of course, a lot of things are not accessible to tourists. But it’s fairly easy to see inside most buildings and generally just tell that e.g. the library is smaller or that the department of X is in a 8-story modern building vs. a 2-story old one. That doesn’t always correlate to “resources available” but as another commenter put it, American universities are practically small city-states.

lm28469 3y ago

US campuses are mini cities with large amount of money spent on a lot of useless things Europe campuses are buildings with just a bit more than the bare minimum you need to do the job

joshvm 3y ago

University funding varies wildly in the UK and it mostly correlates with ranking, at least the 'higher-up' universities generally have more disposal income to give to researchers. Unfortunately, it's a vicious circle because it's the difference between "you can go to this conference" or "we'll pay the article fee" and "we have no money, sorry". Allowing researchers those sorts of freedoms means you tend to get better researchers who can pump out more research with higher visibility. Oxford University owns pretty much the entire historic town centre, so they're sitting on a lot of assets that aren't obviously visible (beyond the colleges). UK universities have generally very good staff benefits. 30-35 days of leave is not uncommon, on top of public holidays and the usual academia "if nobody notices" flexitime attitude. Pay is probably a little better than the US when you compare cost of living. The US has notoriously poor PhD and Postdoc salaries and several big universities have had strike action against them. Don't confuse US institutional endowment with what trickles down to researchers. The US does have per-diem though, which is a fantastic source of beer money when traveling. UK universities are almost always penny-pinchers for staff expenses.

rcarr 3y ago
> University funding varies wildly in the UK and it mostly correlates with ranking, at least the 'higher-up' universities generally have more disposal income to give to researchers. This is how the entirety of the UK works. All the funding goes to London, everywhere else gets nothing. All the laws are written to benefit the landlord and investor classes, everyone else gets nothing etc. Little recognition that the entire nation is meant to be one big tribe, barely any redistribution or attempts to raise up the failing parts. In my opinion, the ruling classes have never really abandoned their colonial mindset, and now their overseas power has waned they treat the rest of the UK as a colony of the City and Westminster.
- gmt2027 3y ago
  I completely agree about the colonial mindset and an inherent bias towards self-perpetuating elitism in the UK.
  - 3y ago