Post

The math of MSCA applications: - Suppose writing an application takes 2 months. - Total cost of hiring a PhD is maybe €5k/month (??) - Applying costs €10k. - Total cost for 21k proposals: €210M - Total funding: €400M So half the budget is wasted on just applications.

Charles West@pseudo-isidore.bsky.social

21,627 applications for the Marie Curie early career fellowships.

Tuukka Korhonen

@laakeri.bsky.social

21 Sept

That's a fun observation, and applies in general to early-career researchers: Significant portion of your productivity is used towards applying for grants/positions. One proposed solution to this is result-based funding: cacm.acm.org/opinion/fund...

cacm.acm.orgFunding Successful Research – Communications of the ACM

Ragnar {Groot Koerkamp}

@curiouscoding.nl

Yeah I've been thinking the same: say you get 3-5 years PhD "for free" and then repeatedly get the next 3 years of funding based on the past 3 years. This of course has the major drawback (as does the current system) that success of your PhD is amplified massively to success of your career...

21/9/26, 1:07 pm0 reposts0 likes

Ragnar {Groot Koerkamp}

@curiouscoding.nl

21 Sept

Maybe we can learn from corporate rewards: - base salary based on past perf (experience/CV/seniority) - bonus based on current (past year) perf - stocks to encourage future perf So proposals could be: - 1/3rd on project finished in last 2 years - 1/3rd ongoing projects - 1/3rd upcoming projects