Researchers in the US are significantly more likely than their counterparts worldwide to consider moving abroad in the next two years to further their career, according to new analysis from Elsevier. The report, which reflects survey responses from more than 3000 researchers across the globe, reveals that 40% of those in the US are contemplating moving to another country, compared with 29% globally. This figure for US researchers represents a 16 percentage point increase compared with three years ago.
The most common reasons US researchers list for considering moving abroad are more freedom to pursue specific research interests (61%), greater work–life balance (58%), and more research funding available in their field abroad (47%). The top destinations for these researchers in the US include Canada (55%), UK (38%), and Germany (32%). However, the Elsevier report found that the US is still the top destination that researchers from India, Japan, and China are considering moving to.
Beyond relocation patterns, the survey results also showed only 9% of US researchers expect that funding for research in their field will increase beyond inflation in the next two to three years, compared with 33% globally. The figure was 14%, in Germany, 15% in the UK, compared to 44% in China and 68% in India.
Overall, the survey data suggest that international mobility may be entering a new phase shaped by geopolitics. ‘Countries that have traditionally attracted many foreign researchers, like the USA, are seeing a change in perception as a destination, potentially influenced by factors such as immigration policy debates and funding allocations,’ the report states. Meanwhile, it notes that many nations, including China, have implemented policies to retain researchers or encourage them to return, such as attractive funding and its ‘Thousand Talents’ programme. ‘The net effect is a dynamic global talent map where some regions are gaining at the expense of others,’ the report concludes.
‘If you look at the acceleration in R&D spending, you’ll see that in China it has increased quite a lot over the last 10 years,’ Adrian Mulligan, Elsevier’s research director and the report’s research lead, tells Chemistry World. ‘So, there’s a more of a sense amongst researchers in China that they’re going to get more funding.’
Neal Lane, a physicist who served as science adviser to former president Bill Clinton and previously as director of the US National Science Foundation, says he is not surprised that many researchers are considering leaving the US for better opportunities. But Lane notes that ‘the percentages are larger’ than he would have expected.
He suggests that many factors are likely at play, including ‘decreasing grant success rates, inadequate project budgets, continued rise in part-time and postdoctoral appointments, dysfunction within the US Congress, the Trump administration’s perceived anti-science/anti-university polices and a lack of competency at high levels of the US government’.
Chemjobber, a Chemistry World contributor and US-based chemist who works in the chemical manufacturing industry, is also unsurprised by these findings, but is sceptical that this exodus of US researchers will materialise. ‘While I do see opportunities from specific institutions or regions, I don’t, for example, see the EU putting hundreds of millions of euros into attracting Americans yet,’ he says. ‘I do think American scientists are very interested in other opportunities (as the findings show) but we’re not yet at the tipping point. I’d be interested in seeing the same poll a year from now.’
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