> We need people who are interested in the science, not those who (pretend to) do it for money. In the US, the problem is mostly the opposite. Lots of people w

> We need people who are interested in the science, not those who (pretend to) do it for money. In the US, the problem is mostly the opposite. Lots of people would rather do science, but it's hard to choose using your skills for real science when some company will pay you 2x-10x to instead optimize ad clicks on their website or algorithmic trading or whatever. In some of the humanities, liberal arts, social sciences etc academia may pay better than other options for those people. But for most STEM folks, it's a tradeoff between "low-paid meaningful work" vs "high-paid meaningless work". Medicine and AI research may be the only two areas where people can simultaneously do cutting edge research and make high salaries.