scientists might do an even better job training them.
Wages are hard to decrease once they’ve gone up
(economists call this ‘downward stickiness’), so if my
suggestion has more of a negative effect on the com-
petitiveness of US science than I think, the government
will simply have to increase the funds available for
scientific research. And that argument - we need more
support because of an acute and easily demonstrable
labor shortage - might be one that even our current
politicians would understand. By restricting the supply,
we might induce some much-needed demand. This is just
one fascinating conclusion I am pondering because of
Paula’s remarkable book. I’ll explore another, our risk-
averse culture in the life sciences, next month.