postdoc shortage
An interesting tribune in Nature (30 August) about the difficulty in hiring postdocs… I myself faced this difficulty in the recent years but though it was mostly due to unattractive French salaries and working conditions, or COVID issues (or myself!). Nature mentions politics, economics, ethics, and personal priorities as main reasons for the postdoctoral drought. In Britain, Brexit is definitely a central factor as candidates face enormous bills to secure entry to the United Kingdom (as Hai-Dang Dau, now in Oxford, was explaining to us after his successful PhD defense at ENSAE-CREST this morning). But more globally this may reflect a general exodus from academia towards company jobs, and their much more attractive salaries. Especially in STEM where Amazon and buddies created a new definition of “dream jobs”… Anyway, I still have a prAirie postdoc position open in Paris Dauphine and the new PariSanté campus provides a great working environment, so feel free to contact me!
Xi'an's Og 
October 6, 2022 at 9:23 am
I agree, that was my case and it was a great experience. But it’s sad that (1) “fully investment in research” can’t be done in actual, “real” positions and (2) it’s getting harder even as a postdoc.
October 5, 2022 at 6:33 pm
The question is, why should people waste time doing a postdoc instead of finding a real job? Science is the only field where people is supposed to gladly wait until >30 years old to get a stable job. (I did a postdoc, but not sure it’s generally a good idea.)
October 5, 2022 at 10:07 pm
You can see it like this but this is also an opportunity to fully invest in research before being torn between teaching, admin, grant hunting, and shattered research time.