Nobel Winners Illustrate Israel's "Brain Drain"

barlevg writes "Two of the three scientists sharing this year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry have Israeli citizenship, with Dr. Arieh Warshel having been born and educated in Israel, yet both are based at universities in the United States. These two scientists are perhaps the highest profile examples of a growing problem in the so-called "start-up nation," which is known for its high-tech tech companies and scientific innovation, and yet which loses more researchers to emigration than any other western nation. The problem? Large salary gaps between US and Israeli institutions. As Daniel Hershkowitz, president of Bar-Ilan University put it, 'I don't see Israel being able to compete with what they offer in the United States.'"

Comments

social/political situation?

[j-beda]

"The problem? Large salary gaps between US and Israeli institutions. "

Nothing to do with the social/political situation in the middle east? I know the USA social and political situation is kind of crazy, but it seems to be a bit saner at the level of organized groups trying to kick each other off this or that piece of land. I suspect that this has at least SOME effect on people's decisions to emigrate.

Re:social/political situation?

[golodh]

Israel's brain drain is serious but it is also one of its life-lines. Whether it appreciates this or not. The constant stream of people traveling between Israel and the West is one of the things that maintain Israel's ties to the US and Europe.

As everywhere in the world the dominant language of discourse in science and engineering is English, and US universities continue to dominate the lists of best and most influential institutions of learning.

If you look around at MIT you will note that 50%-60% of the PhD. students are from abroad. And when they get their degree, they see all kinds of attractive job opportunities right where they live. From start-ups to established companies. And yes, it's one of the ways in which the US attracts talent. It out-competes almost everyone else by offering top-notch education, top-notch research, and top-notch jobs. And that isn't about to change (barring short-sighted politics such as de-funding research).

But perhaps the most important of all: the US really does offer anyone a chance to earn their way solely on personal merit. And that's something very precious that's not available in many other countries where "who you know" counts for more than "what you know".

So yes, there is a tremendous pull. But before you bemoan the big bad US of A luring away all the talent, please realize that there is also (in the case of Israel) a substantial push.

Good friends of mine made Aliyah to Israel about 30 years ago. They were well-educated (an economist and a psychologist) learned Hebrew, did their Miluim (military service), one as a private the other as an officer, and found careers in Tel-Aviv.

What they saw around 15 years ago was a country that increasingly transformed itself from a Western country to a Middle Eastern country. Political polarization, rise of religious ultra-orthodoxy, privileges for religious people (e.g. Torah students exempt from the same military service that takes about a month per year from others), .

What they also saw was a country that was basically unwilling to reach a sustainable accommodation with the Palestinians despite the demographic, economic, legal, and humanitarian issues. They felt the consequences of that in person when their reserve army duties took them to e.g. the Gaza strip where they, in army uniform and armed, would have to face off against 16-18 year old Palestinian protestors / rioters and wield batons (or worse) against people who had no education to speak of, almost no wealth, no opportunities or prospects worth mentioning, no realistic way out, and no serious hopes for improvement. If that were a transitional phase, it would be bearable, but was it? It didn't look that way and it still doesn't.

Attempts to persuade the political majority to reach a sustainable settlement did not succeed (if there were any easy and simple solutions they would have been embraced long ago) and indeed a sustainable settlement seemed drifting further away all the time with the (in part religiously motivated) Eretz Israel (Big Israel) idea.

So they were left with the prospect of staying in an intransigent, polarizing and increasingly besieged country where their children would face the same difficulties, only worse, and without the frictionless alternative of having a double passport.

So they decided to leave and they are not alone. Obviously that segment of the population with the most portable assets (intellect) has the best prospects of leaving.

That's the "push" part of the equation.

So, yes, there's brain-drain but a lively exchange of people and ideas is (as I see it) needed for Israel's mental health. Also there are reasons for the brain-drain that have little to do with big bad US gobbling up all the talent.

Re:American subsidies

[erikkemperman]

I don't think it works that way. Much of the resentment felt towards the US throughout the ME is not just because of their one-sided support for Israel, but mostly because of their support for the brutal regimes of their countries (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, etc).

Re:The amount of Socialism...

[Anonymous Coward]

The only way for socialism to work is via big government because it requires that the government take-to-give. Heck, the two largest budget items are Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security, which are both insolvent. And yes, both are even larger than Defense spending (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Federal_Spending_-_FY_2011.png).

What you meant was Socialism =/= Communism, which is just socialism enforced by a government that controls all of the businesses.

What the US needs is less government, which includes a smaller defense budget, as well as less interference through social programming (intentionally not "programs"). The idea that we cannot go back to even 2008 levels of spending--before the supposedly one-time bailouts and otherwise huge deficits--is ludicrous. Socialism will break the back of an already weakened economy that cannot support the government that does not even bother trying to support itself by avoiding disgustingly high deficits.

Re:American subsidies

[dbIII]

You have got to wonder why a relatively wealthy and developed nation should be the largest recipient

The answer is obvious given the way Washington works. They have a very well run lobby group with good connections to people that set policy. That's the major difference between Israel and any other country with a large US expatriot population.

helping finance the bits ... the US government refuses to support officially, viz the illegal

Wind back not very many years and there's all those people, including currently serving Senators, that were sending money to the IRA at a time when it was being used to buy materials for bombs. Morality tends to get ignored in US international relations.

Re:American subsidies

[gtall]

You left out that the result of American military aid is that their armed forces are now dependent on the U.S. This gives the U.S. leverage to tell them to knock it the fuck off when they start getting in each other's business. In short, they have to keep the peace or they won't have much to fight with.