So, how low do we need to pay Biotech workers to keep Biotech from going overseas?

[Le Jacquelope]

Biotech was supposed to be the new big tech job boom for America.

Now we're sending those jobs overseas, too. Wages are the #2 most important reason why.

How low do we need to go to keep those jobs here?


http://www.pharmamanufacturing.com/articles/2007/100.html

http://www.pharmamanufacturing.com/Media/0706/PM0706_CVRSTY_Reasons4Offshoring.jpg

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

JACQUELOPE

That's not the right question.

The real question is: Why is living in an appliance carton and making 10 cents an hour appealing to Asian scientists?

 

[dr_mabeuse]

When I left the industry in 2001, about 2/3rds of the scientists working at X, the big pharma house I worked at, were foreign-born, and about the same proportion of PhD's in science were going to foreign-born students. Americans weren't interested in science because it doesn't pay compared to MBA's and law degrees.

With the economies in their home countries (mainly India and China) booming, more and more of these foreign scientists at X were going back and joining start-ups or starting their own companies. They of course took our technology with them, though they weren't supposed to (Right. How do you stop them? It's all in their heads.) and often they'd end up subcontracting their services back to X, doing what they used to do at X but in their own labs. X loved this, because it saved them all the environmental and regulatory costs, and all the workers who used to do this job at X got laid off.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I don't see "Broads, young boys, and pot" in that pie chart, Jackalope.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

DOC

Last night I read an old Mencken essay from the 1920s; it was about this exact subject.

Mencken championed business as the best work for Americans. It pays much better than science, is highly esteemed by every American, and after 100 years pass Americans know who John D. Rockefeller was but are stumped to name the current sports celebrity, movie idol, President, or Noble Laureate.

 

[Le Jacquelope]

When I left the industry in 2001, about 2/3rds of the scientists working at X, the big pharma house I worked at, were foreign-born, and about the same proportion of PhD's in science were going to foreign-born students. Americans weren't interested in science because it doesn't pay compared to MBA's and law degrees.

With the economies in their home countries (mainly India and China) booming, more and more of these foreign scientists at X were going back and joining start-ups or starting their own companies. They of course took our technology with them, though they weren't supposed to (Right. How do you stop them? It's all in their heads.) and often they'd end up subcontracting their services back to X, doing what they used to do at X but in their own labs. X loved this, because it saved them all the environmental and regulatory costs, and all the workers who used to do this job at X got laid off.

That's funny, and sounds fairly spot on, because I keep hearing companies whining about the lack of biotech/IT talent in the US but grads in those fields are now throwing their resumes onto increasingly high application piles.

Actions speak louder than words.