They will need to spend waaaay more money across Europe and insist on relaxing working rules if they are planning on attracting top talent. Shit like shutting down VU earth science in Amsterdam after spending 20 million euros on new facilities should not fly. The same is true for the way soft money positions work. I know a nonzero number of people who have won ERC grants which are work millions of euros only to have the university they work at refuse to offer them a contract because they have reached the limit of years allowed to work on a temporary contract. This means they either have to find a new host for their erc or not accept the grant. I love working in Europe as a scientist and have done so for 10+ years. But I think there should be more of everything in order to compete with America.
The issue with soft money positions is mostly that universities insist on being shitty employers.
By default, all jobs are supposed to be open-ended. Fixed-term contracts are only allowed for legitimate reasons. Hiring someone for the expected duration of a PhD is a legitimate reason. The availability of funding is not. And even if the reason would be legitimate in isolation, multiple consecutive fixed-term contracts would be evidence that the employer has a permanent need for the employee, turning the contract automatically permanent.
When I was still in Finland, people were speculating that all postdoc positions were technically illegal, as were tenure-track positions. But it was also understood that if someone actually insisted on enforcing the law, the government would have to change it. Because rewriting the laws is much easier than making universities change their ways.
Agreed. However, how shitty is it when you win a grant worth millions of euros, a large fraction of which would go directly into the university coffers and not your project, and the university responds with, "lol, no thanks."
Lack of ambition I call it. People have become too comfortable. Europe had become rich enough that throwing away such opportunities wouldn't affect them. Now it does, but they are too entrenched to see it. The number of times I've seen a position go empty just because people couldn't resolve their internal conflcits is too high. Also, there's apparently no punishment for letting positions go empty.
I don't think that is it. I think the employment law is written outside the context of how academic research is funded. Unlike companies, academic researchers cannot do something good and then have it generate revenue. You can not build an app and then support it and then use the profits to continue developing new ideas. You can only continue to apply for money to fund ideas. In companies that generate revenue, many countries require permanent positions and just cause for firings with the assumption that as long as there is revenue and profit, the company can't simply lay off people to generate more profit. However, since there is no revenue generation at a university, there is no way to continue to support people who work there beyond the grants that fund their positions. And there is no way to acquire those funds internally except by layoffs which are not allowed because universities will not layoff permanent people to save on money since those permanent people decide the layoffs anyways (who lays off themselves?). This is compounded that many countries have different retirement laws for older professors and they can often times take up departmental resources through emeritus positions that would otherwise go to fund young people seeking permanent positions.
I think that the solution is that university leadership should come from academic staff (e.g., a democratically elected faculty senate plus a rektor team as leader) and they decide layoffs so that administration can be laid off as well as academic teams. Second I think that there should be a reorganization of the university academic staff with responsibilities redistributed. Older professors should teach more and assume advisory positions instead of leadership ones in research projects, younger professors should not teach much at all and focus on driving research forward as research leaders, and there should be more focus on recruiting permanent technical staff to build larger teams at the expense of fewer PhD positions. And funding should change to have fewer grant funds and more long term funds that go towards institutions to build national lab like organizations across europe like there is in the USA, Germany with Helmholtz, etc. Of course this will all cost a lot of money and no one will do this. but i think without a reorg there will simply be more of the same and european innovation will continue to stagnate.
The EU council can publish whatever press release they want - that's not gonna make a slightest dent in the business-hostile environment. Maybe it's perfectly clear for von der Leyen why the EU needs engineers and scientists but these sweet old ladies in the local job center will make sure your application shall never pass. And between those two entities (EU council and your local city council) guess who has the real power over your success?
A successful environment for business forms only when the most local government gives it a go. For example, Poland is quite welcoming and it shows[1].
I would absolutely love for the EU to wake up but in order for that to happen, something needs to change deeply in the governing structure.
Also in the general culture. People I feel are too comfortable. The amount of times I've heard the phrase, "But we don't need to shoot for those stars, I'm okay if we do this small thing that makes us comfortable."
I don't see that WRT Ukraine specifically, but after Trump 2.0 I see an urge to invest more in science and R&D in Europe to offset the cuts in the US. When we bring Ukraine to the discussion, it's obvious the EU needs to invest a lot more in independent military technology that has no connection to outside partners that might no longer be aligned with the Union's objectives.
Why would we buy F-35's when we have Gripen, Rafale and Eurofighter?
They are still plenty of ambitious people in the EU and new folks are growing up. Problem is, path to success in the EU is ridden with endless fights with the bureaucracy even for the simplest things.
Re: general culture: there are much more social protections in the EU (paid vacations, maternity leave, etc) which are truly good and nice but no tech startup is actually practically possible while conforming to these laws.
Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup? I'm guessing this was just an example but a weird one nonetheless.
I always thought the biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business and talent is still much more difficult than a Bay Area company wanting to expand to Texas for example.
> Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup?
No.
> biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business
For business you'll need to address differences in language and culture that are much, much deeper than the ones between the Bay Area and Itasca, TX (which claims to be the most conservative city of the state). Local legislation tends to be less of a problem here than the US though. YMMV.
> and talent
This one is less challenging. The company I work for has a 50/50 balance between "born Irish" and "new Irish" (such as me). Being remote-first is a huge helper.
> Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup? I'm guessing this was just an example but a weird one nonetheless.
Almost none of these rules by itself is insurmountable[1]. But it all adds up friction in the workforce dynamic which might end up halting the company. And afterwards you will be unable to bankrupt the dead company specifically because of the social protections.
Or the sheer inability to fire a developer in Germany because laws here assume that the only work that exists is at a factory producing physical things. So hiring an intellectual worker becomes a huge commitment not to dissimilar to marriage and all of that doesn't help growing.
[1] A notorious exception perhaps would be the paid maternity leave, as fraud with this one is something that happens in real life and can be deadly to a micro startup at the earliest stage.
> I always thought the biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business and talent is still much more difficult than a Bay Area company wanting to expand to Texas for example.
That's why I voted for Brexit. People like von der Leyen will never see sense. They just need to be gotten rid of. If the EU were actually democratic and sensible I wouldn't have a problem with it.
Press releases mean little. Results are what count.
I wonder how fundamentally different your mindset needs to be in order to read "scientists and researchers" and assume it means you, a capitalist businessman.
The problem France has is that the administration (including to deal with immigration status and residence card), tax law, employment law, business laws, everything is highly hostile as soon as you set foot there.
It's bonkers, really, to play against yourself that way.
As a German: It's probably easier to just come here and pretend you lost your passport or something than going the official way. Start the process in multiple Bundesländer, under different names. That way, the bureaucracy probably won't catch up with you for the next 40 years.
Unless this is a sarcasm, you have proven that either you are 150% disconnected from reality or is discounting the entire immigration hurdle and access to every basic necessity(bank, housing, healthcare, work permit, qualification recognition etc) requiring a valid ID.
The most interesting aspect for me is the deep history. In Ireland, in particular, it's not rare to wander around and bump into a neolithic structure. When we were looking for a house to buy, one of the candidates had one such structure on a little nicely preserved square at the end of the street.
The continent is a short flight away. Being in an island, I haven't used the excellent train network of the continent as much as my friends in the continent.
One selling point of this society is the low inequality. I get my hair and beard done in the same place my barista goes - this would be almost unthinkable in Brazil, which is where I come from. Low inequality creates a more cohesive society where class divisions are less relevant. It also reduces crime, because the financial gain is not favorable compared to the risks. Because of that, my police doesn't need firearms and, if someone discharges a gun somewhere, it ends up on the newspapers. Irish politics are remarkably sane (if boring). I assume it's because of list-based voting, that punishes rejection very severely. We wouldn't have a Trump here in Ireland.
Other aspects are free high quality schooling, almost free university education, and an almost free healthcare system. This last is the low point - when you have a two-tier system, you have resources diverted from who needs care to who can pay for it, increasing wait times for those who can't pay for health insurance or private care.
Most of these points stand for the rest of the European Union as well. There are some variations, but not that much.
Final selling point of Ireland is that English is an official language. AFAIK, it's the only country in the EU with English as an official language, at least until the UK decides to rejoin.
.. because they got flagged by the security service.
People spent a lot of the cold war guessing "is this person a defector or a double agent?", and I guess we're going back there. Similar things happen in the US, of course, both for Russians and Chinese people. And let's not forget the Russian tourists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_...
They can invite whoever they want, but I think they will struggle to attract talent unless they actually start making some changes to make it a more attractive option rather than just assuming elsewhere is going to get worse.
I did a post-doc in France after my PhD in the UK. It was possibly worthwhile just for the experience, but the actual funding and research environment is not one I would recommend to my colleagues.
von der Leyen's country, Germany, has a very hostile immigrations system. Not as bad as America these days, but still dystopian. The Auslaenderamt across Germany is filled with racists and bigots.
It depends… There are really good people and there are bad people. While there is room to improve, I have decent number of colleagues who praises the system and decent number who have points that they deserve more respect. That being said, there is a secret saying, if you hate foreigners then you work in immigration to make their life hard and derive pleasure. Other than that, the rules change too much than necessary, because immigrants are the powerless scapegoats for any political and social failure of the nation, so the case workers are always playing catchup to the new changes and commit mistakes both unintentionally and intentionally(to avoid legal issues).
The EU is hostile to all emerging technologies like AI, why would any scientist go there? Let alone the poverty wages you'll earn and the 50%+ tax you'll pay.
By "hostile" are you referring to Europe's tendency to adopt new technologies deliberately and methodically, taking into consideration things like ethics, public safety, and societal impact? I think it's hostile (to people) to not do these things, to charge towards new and potentially society-altering technologies with roughly the same level of caution and care as the Kool-Aid Man smashing through walls with reckless abandon
There's a saying in German that roughly translates to "When two are fighting, the third benefits."
This'll end up being the case here as well. While the US and China battle fiercely, the EU will be the only safe haven for both of their investments and we'll grow even richer while enjoying our three hour lunch break.
To battle fiercely is to become weaker and more dependent on others who are not battling.
They will need to spend waaaay more money across Europe and insist on relaxing working rules if they are planning on attracting top talent. Shit like shutting down VU earth science in Amsterdam after spending 20 million euros on new facilities should not fly. The same is true for the way soft money positions work. I know a nonzero number of people who have won ERC grants which are work millions of euros only to have the university they work at refuse to offer them a contract because they have reached the limit of years allowed to work on a temporary contract. This means they either have to find a new host for their erc or not accept the grant. I love working in Europe as a scientist and have done so for 10+ years. But I think there should be more of everything in order to compete with America.
The issue with soft money positions is mostly that universities insist on being shitty employers.
By default, all jobs are supposed to be open-ended. Fixed-term contracts are only allowed for legitimate reasons. Hiring someone for the expected duration of a PhD is a legitimate reason. The availability of funding is not. And even if the reason would be legitimate in isolation, multiple consecutive fixed-term contracts would be evidence that the employer has a permanent need for the employee, turning the contract automatically permanent.
When I was still in Finland, people were speculating that all postdoc positions were technically illegal, as were tenure-track positions. But it was also understood that if someone actually insisted on enforcing the law, the government would have to change it. Because rewriting the laws is much easier than making universities change their ways.
Agreed. However, how shitty is it when you win a grant worth millions of euros, a large fraction of which would go directly into the university coffers and not your project, and the university responds with, "lol, no thanks."
Lack of ambition I call it. People have become too comfortable. Europe had become rich enough that throwing away such opportunities wouldn't affect them. Now it does, but they are too entrenched to see it. The number of times I've seen a position go empty just because people couldn't resolve their internal conflcits is too high. Also, there's apparently no punishment for letting positions go empty.
I don't think that is it. I think the employment law is written outside the context of how academic research is funded. Unlike companies, academic researchers cannot do something good and then have it generate revenue. You can not build an app and then support it and then use the profits to continue developing new ideas. You can only continue to apply for money to fund ideas. In companies that generate revenue, many countries require permanent positions and just cause for firings with the assumption that as long as there is revenue and profit, the company can't simply lay off people to generate more profit. However, since there is no revenue generation at a university, there is no way to continue to support people who work there beyond the grants that fund their positions. And there is no way to acquire those funds internally except by layoffs which are not allowed because universities will not layoff permanent people to save on money since those permanent people decide the layoffs anyways (who lays off themselves?). This is compounded that many countries have different retirement laws for older professors and they can often times take up departmental resources through emeritus positions that would otherwise go to fund young people seeking permanent positions.
I think that the solution is that university leadership should come from academic staff (e.g., a democratically elected faculty senate plus a rektor team as leader) and they decide layoffs so that administration can be laid off as well as academic teams. Second I think that there should be a reorganization of the university academic staff with responsibilities redistributed. Older professors should teach more and assume advisory positions instead of leadership ones in research projects, younger professors should not teach much at all and focus on driving research forward as research leaders, and there should be more focus on recruiting permanent technical staff to build larger teams at the expense of fewer PhD positions. And funding should change to have fewer grant funds and more long term funds that go towards institutions to build national lab like organizations across europe like there is in the USA, Germany with Helmholtz, etc. Of course this will all cost a lot of money and no one will do this. but i think without a reorg there will simply be more of the same and european innovation will continue to stagnate.
I live and run an IT startup in the EU.
The EU council can publish whatever press release they want - that's not gonna make a slightest dent in the business-hostile environment. Maybe it's perfectly clear for von der Leyen why the EU needs engineers and scientists but these sweet old ladies in the local job center will make sure your application shall never pass. And between those two entities (EU council and your local city council) guess who has the real power over your success?
A successful environment for business forms only when the most local government gives it a go. For example, Poland is quite welcoming and it shows[1].
I would absolutely love for the EU to wake up but in order for that to happen, something needs to change deeply in the governing structure.
[1] https://notesfrompoland.com/2024/08/14/polands-records-eus-f...
Also in the general culture. People I feel are too comfortable. The amount of times I've heard the phrase, "But we don't need to shoot for those stars, I'm okay if we do this small thing that makes us comfortable."
The ambitious people have left for the US.
I think this was true 10 years ago but nut anymore after Ukraine.
I hope but I'm not so sure.
I'm not so sure. I have a bit of insight into the ukraine-war-related contracts and all I can see is just some change, but not a substantial change.
They still prefer committees and meetings over actual shell production.
The fact only Ukraine is at war complicates things a bit - funding and the risk of creating secondary impacts are still an issue.
I don't see that WRT Ukraine specifically, but after Trump 2.0 I see an urge to invest more in science and R&D in Europe to offset the cuts in the US. When we bring Ukraine to the discussion, it's obvious the EU needs to invest a lot more in independent military technology that has no connection to outside partners that might no longer be aligned with the Union's objectives.
Why would we buy F-35's when we have Gripen, Rafale and Eurofighter?
They are still plenty of ambitious people in the EU and new folks are growing up. Problem is, path to success in the EU is ridden with endless fights with the bureaucracy even for the simplest things.
Re: general culture: there are much more social protections in the EU (paid vacations, maternity leave, etc) which are truly good and nice but no tech startup is actually practically possible while conforming to these laws.
Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup? I'm guessing this was just an example but a weird one nonetheless.
I always thought the biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business and talent is still much more difficult than a Bay Area company wanting to expand to Texas for example.
> Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup?
No.
> biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business
For business you'll need to address differences in language and culture that are much, much deeper than the ones between the Bay Area and Itasca, TX (which claims to be the most conservative city of the state). Local legislation tends to be less of a problem here than the US though. YMMV.
> and talent
This one is less challenging. The company I work for has a 50/50 balance between "born Irish" and "new Irish" (such as me). Being remote-first is a huge helper.
> Are 20ish days of paid vacation per employee per year really an insurmountable obstacle for a tech startup? I'm guessing this was just an example but a weird one nonetheless.
Almost none of these rules by itself is insurmountable[1]. But it all adds up friction in the workforce dynamic which might end up halting the company. And afterwards you will be unable to bankrupt the dead company specifically because of the social protections.
Or the sheer inability to fire a developer in Germany because laws here assume that the only work that exists is at a factory producing physical things. So hiring an intellectual worker becomes a huge commitment not to dissimilar to marriage and all of that doesn't help growing.
[1] A notorious exception perhaps would be the paid maternity leave, as fraud with this one is something that happens in real life and can be deadly to a micro startup at the earliest stage.
> I always thought the biggest hurdle to overcome here in the EU is despite advancements with the schengen zone is branching out to other countries for business and talent is still much more difficult than a Bay Area company wanting to expand to Texas for example.
Correct, because of the same bureaucracy.
This is too general. EU is many countries. Starting a business in Sweden is insanely easy for example...
In Poland it is easy as well.
That's why I voted for Brexit. People like von der Leyen will never see sense. They just need to be gotten rid of. If the EU were actually democratic and sensible I wouldn't have a problem with it.
Press releases mean little. Results are what count.
I wonder how fundamentally different your mindset needs to be in order to read "scientists and researchers" and assume it means you, a capitalist businessman.
Let me extend my heartfelt congratulations on the International Workers Day, dear comrade!
There's nothing of substance here, there's isn't any actual visa or residency fast track or any reforms mentioned just a vague "invitation".
Those programs are on a national level due to how the EU works. Here's the French one: https://france2030.agencerecherche.fr/ChooseFranceForScience...
The problem France has is that the administration (including to deal with immigration status and residence card), tax law, employment law, business laws, everything is highly hostile as soon as you set foot there.
It's bonkers, really, to play against yourself that way.
The same can be said of the US under the Trump regime.
And before... the process has been a nightmare for years - be it for H1-B, L1 or even O1 visas.
As a German: It's probably easier to just come here and pretend you lost your passport or something than going the official way. Start the process in multiple Bundesländer, under different names. That way, the bureaucracy probably won't catch up with you for the next 40 years.
Unless this is a sarcasm, you have proven that either you are 150% disconnected from reality or is discounting the entire immigration hurdle and access to every basic necessity(bank, housing, healthcare, work permit, qualification recognition etc) requiring a valid ID.
My move was the easiest thing ever, and a four-year Blue Card was great. QoL is phenomenal, too.
I can tell you I have zero regrets from moving to Ireland almost ten years ago.
I second Ursula’s invitation. There’s much wonder to discover this side of the Atlantic.
I'd love to hear more about what you like about living there.
The most interesting aspect for me is the deep history. In Ireland, in particular, it's not rare to wander around and bump into a neolithic structure. When we were looking for a house to buy, one of the candidates had one such structure on a little nicely preserved square at the end of the street.
The continent is a short flight away. Being in an island, I haven't used the excellent train network of the continent as much as my friends in the continent.
One selling point of this society is the low inequality. I get my hair and beard done in the same place my barista goes - this would be almost unthinkable in Brazil, which is where I come from. Low inequality creates a more cohesive society where class divisions are less relevant. It also reduces crime, because the financial gain is not favorable compared to the risks. Because of that, my police doesn't need firearms and, if someone discharges a gun somewhere, it ends up on the newspapers. Irish politics are remarkably sane (if boring). I assume it's because of list-based voting, that punishes rejection very severely. We wouldn't have a Trump here in Ireland.
Other aspects are free high quality schooling, almost free university education, and an almost free healthcare system. This last is the low point - when you have a two-tier system, you have resources diverted from who needs care to who can pay for it, increasing wait times for those who can't pay for health insurance or private care.
Most of these points stand for the rest of the European Union as well. There are some variations, but not that much.
Final selling point of Ireland is that English is an official language. AFAIK, it's the only country in the EU with English as an official language, at least until the UK decides to rejoin.
At the same time an EU country is deporting Russian scientists and banning them from the Schengen zone: https://meduza.io/en/feature/2025/04/14/sweden-s-security-se...
Is there a better way to coerce them to go work for putin instead of the western world?
.. because they got flagged by the security service.
People spent a lot of the cold war guessing "is this person a defector or a double agent?", and I guess we're going back there. Similar things happen in the US, of course, both for Russians and Chinese people. And let's not forget the Russian tourists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Sergei_and_Yulia_...
They can invite whoever they want, but I think they will struggle to attract talent unless they actually start making some changes to make it a more attractive option rather than just assuming elsewhere is going to get worse.
I did a post-doc in France after my PhD in the UK. It was possibly worthwhile just for the experience, but the actual funding and research environment is not one I would recommend to my colleagues.
von der Leyen's country, Germany, has a very hostile immigrations system. Not as bad as America these days, but still dystopian. The Auslaenderamt across Germany is filled with racists and bigots.
It depends… There are really good people and there are bad people. While there is room to improve, I have decent number of colleagues who praises the system and decent number who have points that they deserve more respect. That being said, there is a secret saying, if you hate foreigners then you work in immigration to make their life hard and derive pleasure. Other than that, the rules change too much than necessary, because immigrants are the powerless scapegoats for any political and social failure of the nation, so the case workers are always playing catchup to the new changes and commit mistakes both unintentionally and intentionally(to avoid legal issues).
The EU is hostile to all emerging technologies like AI, why would any scientist go there? Let alone the poverty wages you'll earn and the 50%+ tax you'll pay.
That's just straight up FUD.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/en/article/20230601STO...
https://www.euronews.com/next/2024/10/08/why-openais-voice-m...
The EU despises technical advancement and will kill it at any cost.
Regulation is the source from which all advancement is derived.
By "hostile" are you referring to Europe's tendency to adopt new technologies deliberately and methodically, taking into consideration things like ethics, public safety, and societal impact? I think it's hostile (to people) to not do these things, to charge towards new and potentially society-altering technologies with roughly the same level of caution and care as the Kool-Aid Man smashing through walls with reckless abandon
Absolutely I mean that. They'll get left behind, again. Like every other major economic and technical breakthrough.
While the US and China battle fiercely, the EU is still on their 3 hour lunch break.
There's a saying in German that roughly translates to "When two are fighting, the third benefits."
This'll end up being the case here as well. While the US and China battle fiercely, the EU will be the only safe haven for both of their investments and we'll grow even richer while enjoying our three hour lunch break.
To battle fiercely is to become weaker and more dependent on others who are not battling.
The Slovak version: "Kde sa dvaja bijú, tretí víťazí."
"Where two fight, victory goes to third."