> Do you think the government is a good actor to judge if my qualifications are good enough to grant me resources worth a house?
Governments already routinely do that for pharmaceutical research or for nuclear (fusion) research. In fact, almost all major impact research and development was funded by the government, mostly the military. Lasers, microwaves, silicon, interconnected computers - all funded by the US tax payer, back in the golden times when you'd get laughed out of the room if you dared think about "small government". And the sums involved were ridiculously larger than the worth of a house. We're talking of billions of dollars.
Nowadays, R&D funding is way WAY more complex. Some things like AI or mRNA vaccines are mostly funded by private venture capital, some are funded by large philanthropic donors (e.g. Gates Foundation), some by the inconceivably enormous university endowments, a lot by in-house researchers at large corporations, and a select few by government grants.
The result of that complexity:
- professors have to spend an absurd percentage of their time "chasing grants" (anecdata, up to 40% [1]) instead of actually doing research
- because grants are time-restricted, it's rare to have tenure track any more
- because of the time restriction and low grant amounts, it's very hard for the support staff as well. In Germany and Austria, for example, extremely low paid "chain contracts" are common - one contract after another, usually for a year, but sometimes as low as half a year. It's virtually impossible to have a social life if you have to up-root it for every contract because you have to take contracts wherever they are, and forget about starting a family because it's just so damn insecure. The only ones that can make it usually come from highly privileged environments: rich parents or, rarely, partners that can support you.
Everyone in academia outside of tenured professors struggles with surviving, and the system ruthlessly grinds people to their bones. It's a disgrace.
Pharmaceutical or nuclear research doesn't really classify as "small scale" as this thread started. I know there are massive amounts of money handed our by governments to fund research, but for a 3 guy startup in a garage that's probably hopeless. Public money is cursed anyways, it's better not to touch it.
I've also read it at many places, that academic research funding is way too misaligned. It's a shame, really.
Governments already routinely do that for pharmaceutical research or for nuclear (fusion) research. In fact, almost all major impact research and development was funded by the government, mostly the military. Lasers, microwaves, silicon, interconnected computers - all funded by the US tax payer, back in the golden times when you'd get laughed out of the room if you dared think about "small government". And the sums involved were ridiculously larger than the worth of a house. We're talking of billions of dollars.
Nowadays, R&D funding is way WAY more complex. Some things like AI or mRNA vaccines are mostly funded by private venture capital, some are funded by large philanthropic donors (e.g. Gates Foundation), some by the inconceivably enormous university endowments, a lot by in-house researchers at large corporations, and a select few by government grants.
The result of that complexity:
- professors have to spend an absurd percentage of their time "chasing grants" (anecdata, up to 40% [1]) instead of actually doing research
- because grants are time-restricted, it's rare to have tenure track any more
- because of the time restriction and low grant amounts, it's very hard for the support staff as well. In Germany and Austria, for example, extremely low paid "chain contracts" are common - one contract after another, usually for a year, but sometimes as low as half a year. It's virtually impossible to have a social life if you have to up-root it for every contract because you have to take contracts wherever they are, and forget about starting a family because it's just so damn insecure. The only ones that can make it usually come from highly privileged environments: rich parents or, rarely, partners that can support you.
Everyone in academia outside of tenured professors struggles with surviving, and the system ruthlessly grinds people to their bones. It's a disgrace.
[1] https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2011/04/25/chasing-grants/