Where can US researchers earn the highest salary in Europe?

The past few weeks have seen initiatives multiply across Europe to tempt disgruntled researchers in the United States into making a move across the Atlantic as US President Donald Trump clamps down on the country’s research and higher education institutes. How do different countries compare in terms of academic salaries? asks Daphné Leprince-Ringuet for Sifted.

This month European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced a €500 million (US$567 million) funding package as part of a new initiative dubbed ‘Choose Europe for Science’ to attract foreign talent to the EU. It followed a similar programme called ‘Choose France for Science’, launched in April, and the announcement of a new fund for foreign scientists in the Netherlands. In the UK, a £50 million (US$67 million) scheme is being implemented to attract researchers from abroad.

These attempts have been met with scepticism from European scientists, with many pointing out that the region’s lower salaries and heavier bureaucracy would be enough to put off talent relocating from the US. Others argued that the financial equation could be balanced out. The situation varies significantly from one country to the next, with vastly different compensation packages, government funding and costs of living depending on where you look.
Full report on the Sifted site