Britain has lost its ability to attract the best scientists and its universities must pay academics more to reverse the 'brain drain', according to research by economists, writes Jon Swaine for The Telegraph. Twice as many physicists from a sample of the world's elite left Britain after completing their first degree than 25 other leading scientific countries, the study found.

It said Britain was unable to compete with the US and Switzerland, the two countries found to be able to attract the best scientists, where wages for top academics are higher. While Britain was second only to the US as the birth-place of the most highly-cited physicists, it fell below Germany, Switzerland and Japan when current locations were compared.

The researchers, from the universities of Warwick and Newcastle, concluded that increases in the "wage premium" in receiving countries of top scientists would reinforce the trend and see more movement away from Britain. They said that "top scholars head to countries with high levels of research and development funding", which is declining in Britain compared to other leading countries. While other countries were found to be experiencing the same trend, Britain lost six top physicists compared to three in Canada and Australia, the nearest net losers. When adjusted for population size, only these two and Austria did worse than Britain.
Full report on The Telegraph site

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