The U.S. has long enjoyed a preeminent position in the world of science. The nation does more research, publishes more articles that are cited by more scientists and wins more Nobel Prizes than any other. It has also long been the chief destination for scientists and engineers from other countries—many U.S. Nobel laureates are foreign-born.

This article was originally published with the title The Other 1 Percent.

5 Comments

1. 1. mormovies 03:25 PM 10/9/12

   If this is true in the field of science it should be true universally.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

2. 2. dickburkhart 01:23 PM 10/27/12

   Actually the pay differentials are becoming excessive. They are part of the "winner take all" ethos of the US that is creating such dysfunctionality (read the book "The Spirit Level"). Scientific fraud and plagiarism are on the rise, and "publish or perish" has long led to an excess of repetitious publishing and elaboration of old lines of inquiry instead of the riskier development of new, especially interdisciplinary. For example, from a scientific point of view the field of economics is moribund, from a societal point of view dysfunctional and ideological, yet few scientists from other areas have ventured into this area, despite the golden opportunity to apply complexity theory.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

3. 3. RSchmidt 03:23 PM 12/7/12

   There was an article here a while ago that indicated that financial reward suffered from the law of diminishing returns. In other words; I will get 10x more innovation if I offer people $1m rather than $100k. But I will not get 10x more innocation if I offer $10m rather than $1m. I may actually got no more innovate than offering $1m. This is the core of the right wing mantra, the more money you funnel into the pockets of the wealthy, the better off everyone is. This is likely not true. I think there are other carrots that are better drivers of innovation such as giving researchers more freedom to pursue more "risky" ideas and a reduction in the red tape required to secure grants. There was an interesting article about how some grant agencies were reducing the complexity of grant applications and going with a evolutionary algorithm approach; divide your grant money in half. Give half the money to researchers who have had successful projects in the past, and give the other half randomly to the rest of the field. If we take the Hollywood approach, only give money to the potential blockbusters, then you will stifle innovation.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

4. 4. mounthell 05:41 PM 12/15/12

   Research facilities that attract celebrated researchers tend to attract more media coverage and, therefore, funding and donor names for their even bigger new institutes. This is not science, baby, it's +Knowle(dge)-wood+!
   
   Salk bought glam Crick and his penchant for dogmas to do mind research but nothing interesting came of his reductionist research. It's big-institution egotism, little science.
   
   This article's cheerleader apparently thinks big pay differentials are a good thing only because he can't think of anything that better suits the socially desirable result, such as group-distributed bonuses.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this

5. 5. HubertB 12:52 PM 12/22/12

   Pay inequality does not win Nobel Prizes. The trickle down theory simply does not work in science.
   Affirmative Action does not win Nobel Prizes. Multiculturalism does not win Nobel Prizes.
   Recognizing the smartest young scientists and giving them the tools they need wins Nobel Prizes. Money must go toward an ever changing frontier.

   Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this