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A top Harvard mathematician just left US for China. Many want to follow in his footsteps.
Dear friends,
The Post has been reporting on the many academics of Chinese origin who have chosen to leave their positions at institutions in the United States and return to China.
This week, we delve into the story of a top Harvard statistician who has returned to China – a move that attracted a lot of discussion online.
On August 30, Liu Jun, a tenured professor of statistics at Harvard University, announced that he has become a full-time professor at Tsinghua University. He has been awarded the “Xinghua Distinguished Chair Professor”, which is the highest title at Tsinghua University. It has only been awarded to two other individuals.
On September 7, The Post published a story on Liu’s return to China, which sparked heated discussion on social media and online forums, particularly in academic circles.
On Reddit, for instance, the news of his return garnered 40,000 likes and nearly 2,000 comments.
Speaking to the Post in an exclusive interview on Friday, Liu provided clarification on the reasons behind his return to China.
It “has nothing to do with Trump”, he said in an email to the Post, explaining that his decision was not out of political protest or professional disillusionment, but because of family and a lifelong bond with the Tsinghua campus where he was born.
Here, we will share how our exclusive report came about.
To understand the attitudes of netizens towards Professor Liu's return to China from Harvard, we reviewed all 2,000 comments on a repost of our article on Reddit, which was published in the /technology subreddit. Many of the comments came from users in the university and tech industry fields.
Our examination found that although there are a few curses and “WHO CARES”-style MAGA comments, the response mostly focused on Liu's research and the impact of his move to China.
In particular, they discussed his contributions to the Monte Carlo method, Bayesian cognitive science, computational biology and bioinformatics. The comments even discussed his hobbies, such as his fountain pen collection, as well as numerous anecdotes from Harvard alumni and his students, with several leaving comments such as “this guy was my professor at Harvard STAT 220.”
What got our attention the most is the dissatisfaction expressed by many who left comments with the US government’s current policies on science and medicine, which have led many American scientists, doctors and technicians to consider leaving – or at least seriously contemplate leaving – the United States.
“I’m leaving as soon as my Portuguese citizenship clears. PhD in health systems and going to laterally transfer to [a] job in Switzerland. Done with this,” one comment read.
Another comment read: “They've been doing this since 2017/2018. I had a colleague who came to the USA from China and had a very successful 30-year career. He asked me to help him put together a comparison (in 2017-2018) of the costs to run a lab in the USA compared to an offer he had received at a new biopark at a university in China.
“Absolutely no comparison. The money was better in China, no charge for facilities, a large number of graduate students, access to more resources, and multi-year commitments. The only pro was that hardware (ddPCR, etc) was cheaper in the USA.
“The best offer he received in the States was a partial comp of his salary. In my opinion, research quality in the USA is still better, but the environment here has done a great deal to tarnish its reputation. If there's a recovery, it will take five times longer. China has gotten better since then.
Yet another comment said: “It’s not just China. I know people in the sciences who’ve moved to the UK and EU with permanent contracts/ tenured contracts. And they had multiple offers. It’s definitely a little unfair to highly experienced EU-born scientists, but it’s also a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reverse some of the brain drain America has enacted on Europe over the past several decades.”
There are countless examples; we found more than a dozen such cases in the comments under just a single post on Reddit.
The moves of these lesser-known scientists, doctors and technicians might not appear on the news as often.
They may not all be star scientists or academicians holding prestigious titles, but they are all professionals in their respective fields, experts in a particular domain, and indispensable figures in the realms of research and industry.
This “brain drain” of talent in the United States is continuing to accelerate.
Talent loss does not merely refer to people leaving the United States.
It also refers to the fact that thousands of the most intelligent individuals on Earth have lost opportunities and jobs.
These professionals all came to the United States to study, teach or work,, and now they are leaving, taking their expertise with them.
This is the story behind our article: Why did Harvard top mathematician Liu Jun leave the US for China?
The ripples created by the current administration's policies will last for a long time, and may even continue to propagate indefinitely.
Would you like to share your own story, or those of your friends and relatives, of leaving the US as a scientist? Feel free to email me at shi.huang@scmp.com.
Cheers,
Shi Huang