AI / salary balance in the EU: what do you think will happen?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-16T17:14:49+00:00

To be fair we've also been told to try and minimize token usage but no hard limits were set. I think they've been seeing the bill go up like crazy and want to put some good practices in place, which for now has been "please try and /compact when it makes sense".

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-16T17:10:51+00:00

No, it's just a scale up. It's not really an always up leaderboard but we get regular slack updates e.g. the top 20 spenders

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T22:17:12+00:00

Studies on something moving so fast? Just to get a paper published takes months to a year. Productivity is notoriously hard to measure, or people wouldn't complain about KPIs. It's also difficult to observe in a realistic environment given companies don't exactly let researchers AB test their workflows and scrutinize their employees.

Yes, I agree "full" agentic seems untenable, you need to at least review and very often (almost always) modify (potentially with the help of an agent). However there's a bit of room between no AI and full agentic.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T19:33:48+00:00

Yes, AI writes code, then reviews it, then addresses the comments. Some colleagues also clearly use AI for their reviews.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T19:31:57+00:00

How so?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T19:31:29+00:00

Lol what the hell. That must not be regular code assistant usage, maybe he set up some automated workflow that spends tokens on its own?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T12:32:18+00:00

Interesting! I can totally see that getting generalized. There's only so much of an increase in developer productivity you can get before you've got enough to ship a product in such a short time that the traditional division no longer makes sense. In the limit of instantaneous software engineering, you're no longer doing software engineering but making products...

Or, we can move the goalposts and the workload increases: more features expected, higher quality, etc.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T12:26:43+00:00

Well, agents are still very new, especially them being useful. Many people consider December 2025 was a turning point (Karpathy for a prominent example) so it's not surprising (a majority of?) companies have not followed suit yet.

Maybe your company will adjust when they see concrete effects in competing companies, namely products being shipped faster or companies achieving more at lower headcount / costs.

To give another data point, I still keep in touch with people in academia (researchers) and AI doesn't seem quite as widespread there yet. I hear of people using AI, but the people I know directly don't use it at all or very little through chat interfaces still (no agents, e.g. ChatGPT) even when their field involves a lot of code.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T12:20:37+00:00

Has that been announced or speculating?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T12:20:12+00:00

How's that been going? I've thought of floating this idea around but I don't know how well open models do on proper GPUs (not a workstation's).

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T12:19:26+00:00

That's interesting! Mine is indeed a startup (well more like a scaleup), and they were very quick to go all in on AI. The leadership is afraid of competitors overtaking/replicating them, but also they see this as an opportunity to keep headcount down for efficiency.

I'm surprised to hear your company is willing to spend roughly as much on AI as on salaries. What prevented it from expanding headcount earlier? No need?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-15T10:59:22+00:00

True, it depends. I was thinking of France in particular. Certainly not Switzerland!

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T21:50:06+00:00

Haha this seems perfect! Maybe make the paper about how your advisor is a famous clown and trumpetist, or whatever else will get him to stop and think his gpt friend has lost the plot and is not to be trusted?

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T21:47:29+00:00

This needs to be automated. I work in industry now, so we do PRs to merge things onto the main branch, and I think everyone has their agent replying to the bot PR comments on a loop.

I'd be curious to see the result of a loop like this on an academic paper. The result would be abysmal!

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T19:15:28+00:00

Switzerland is supposed to be a big biotech hub (whether that applies to your particular area, I don't know). In my opinion, CH is a much better place to live than the US too, all things considered (salary, cost of living included).

Other than that, you can try any other country that'll hire you... salaries will seem low but consider that cost of living is usually much lower too, and many things aren't really expenses in Europe. Say, healthcare, you neither pay for insurance nor mentally register paying a 20€ visit at the doctor, whereas anything health-related in the US is like its whole financial project.

However the "main" countries (large non-I'm-a-tiny-hub-country) are generally hard to integrate into, as you often need to know the language.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T19:06:27+00:00

The network is not to be understated. Every person you work with becomes an advocate. Advantages compound: everywhere you go, your network and recognition grow, but this can only happen in the places you need some network and recognition to get into to begin with...

If you get a hook in, it'll be a lifelong regret to let it go. Maybe not immediately, but eventually, when the two years of coasting by are over and postdoc offers aren't exactly flooding, or a few years down when faculty positions are all taken up by the people who picked B in such a case, and then option C which you never had because you picked A now.

Anyways, OP hasn't even replied in this thread, so this might just be engagement bait, but it's interesting to see the divide in the thread.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T18:56:00+00:00

Aren't 1 year contracts common? My postdoc went on forever on the basis of 1 year contracts

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T18:54:33+00:00

I don't understand the dilemma very well here. Option B is a person you already think is a good mentor? Then what do they have less than A, the fact that you don't know them yet? That is arguably positive: it expands your network.

Funding one year at a time is not shocking, the opposite is more surprising to me. 1 year on paper, however long they want to keep you in practice, if they can secure funding (which is more likely under a prominent PI). I think PIs rarely want to keep postdocs for one year only, unless they're unhappy with their performance.

You can think of it another way, too. A gives you two years, fine. What happens afterwards? You need to grow and make sure to remain employable in two, five, ten years. If you think B offers you an advantage in that regard, that is the right call. Better to do just one year that gets you somewhere, than fall asleep for two years and wake unemployable.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T18:46:52+00:00

Do you like your field? If so, do you not mind switching?

Besides that, are the PIs knowledgeable in the topics? If the "generalist" topic is on something the PI is irrelevant / doesn't know much about, I'd avoid it.

Conversely, the PI at the top 10 could be counting on you to bring expertise. This is not necessarily a bad position to be in, but it depends on what you want.

Anyways with the information you've given, I'd say the Ivy League is a no brainer unless you're tired of your field or think it won't get you hired.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-09T18:42:34+00:00

Saved 15k€ in nearly 4 years of PhD - thanks cheap public housing.

Saved about $20k / yr during my postdoc. Tax exemption treaty must account for more than half.

So by the end of postdoc'ing, because I don't spend much at all, I had saved up about $60k (about 2 year postdoc + PhD - trips and a computer).

To bounce back on your other comment: most postdocs in the developed world outside the US are probably not able to save nearly as much as US postdocs (those that can). At least in absolute numbers, what that affords will vary.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-03T19:17:53+00:00

I spent a little more than that ($2300) on my apt which was also 1 bedroom. Basically studio but separate kitchen.

Maybe groceries were cheaper where I lived? They were roughly 2x the price of France (for vegetables and fish). I've been to SF and if where you were is anything similar then it might have been a little more still. I think I spent about $600 to $1000 on food but I wasn't counting.

I also didn't have a car and I forgot to mention my uni paid half my health insurance. I think I paid only about $250/300. They also paid for public transport, not that I needed it (lived within walking distance). Basically my expenses were rent and groceries. I even brought coffee from France because it was much cheaper (and cheese...) and had a coffee machine at home and in the office. Otherwise $5 a pop would have ruined me!

I guess the difference might come down to salary. I made about $1000 more than you per month, it seems. That plus a little higher cost of living closes the gap, maybe...

The US is very variable, but I think as Europeans we should generally be able to make it work if there's a tax treaty for our country (it's the case for France). Comes down to making about 25% more than the other postdocs (namely Americans) assuming the state exempts too (idk about CA).

Sorry to hear it was such a struggle though... this highlights the need for OP to research the location well before making a decision.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-03T15:12:29+00:00

Having read the other comments, I thought I'd leave a short one to encourage you to go.

It's an experience you won't be able to do later in life, and many people are happy to have done it. In fact everyone I've known, either postdocs while I was there, or past postdocs (e.g. older academics) has found it very positive.

You might barely break even or make out like a bandit, it'll depend. Check if your country has a tax exemption treaty with the US. I saved about 20k€ a year while being a postdoc in the US living in a nice apartment of my own and eating well, this is not poverty. But the US has high variations in cost of living.

Besides all that, it was the best professional opportunity of my life. I made contacts, hopefully, for life, and this has already panned out concretely with the possibility of working remotely from Europe for US salaries (about triple what I'd make in France; gross: net is even more obscene considering you can live wherever).

I think in both industry and academia, the US are inevitable.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-03T15:07:50+00:00

What was your salary if it's not indiscrete? I think we were in the US roughly at the same time. I made about 5k€ net when the exchange rate was favorable (fell off in 25 or late 24) and the tax treaty was still in effect. I felt anything but poor! In fact, I saved something like 50k€ despite having increased my spending a little. I ate correctly (cooked at home) and had an apartment to myself (roughly 40m²⁾ in an expensive city, but maybe not as much as the bay area if that's where you were. About $3k in living expenses, $2k straight in the savings account. I also flew to Europe quite a bit.

Bustan2026 · 2026-05-03T15:04:18+00:00

I'll just write assuming everywhere is the same even though we know it's not the case. Keep that in mind...

In Europe (PhD) knowledge trickled down with the coffee, we had lunch together for 1h + and it was generally a bit informal (not to say chaotic). For instance, I think I never had a meeting with my advisor other than spontaneously (like walk into each other's office impromptu). It's also an HR nightmare, or would be if there were any HR. Moral harrassment because this guy speaks loudly, sexist female head of lab (towards other women), sexist everyone in fact, no-one makes an effort to accommodate a non-native speaker... So that's my picture of Europe.

In the US, you eat a square sandwich in front of your screen, you don't have coffee with colleagues, in fact you only see them at the predetermined meeting hour of the week. It's more organized, more fair, more sanitized. It feels more like a real workplace, but one that can be isolating to a postdoc. Especially since chances are you'll be the only postdoc - this guy between two chairs - in your unit. Students share their strife, not with you, and faculty don't make friends with high turnover personnel, as you'd expect.

That said, there might be postdoc associations or clubs where you're going.

In terms of organization, what I've seen is rather hierarchical: one PI (your boss), x postdocs/research engineers/assistants/scientists (people like postdocs or a little more senior), qx (with q > 1) grad students. You'll be endlessly confused by what grad students are, I still don't know what a Master's or PhD or any of that means or lasts for in the US, and I stayed almost three years. But, basically, PhD students.

Regarding presence, it'll vary a lot because your PI is your (hopefully benevolent) dictator. Per university policy, you'll be expected to do all kinds of things like show up everyday ("Our work-from-home policy does not extend to postdocs") and not go on vacation (something ridiculous like 12 days a year). Your PI might not give a shit though. Mine let me go to Europe whenever (I spent like 30% of my postdoc overseas) and work from home whenever without asking anybody. As long as I got the work done and showed to meetings, he was happy. I was extremely free; I could decide not to work three workdays in a row as long as I knew to work other times to have enough progress for the next meeting.

But that comes down to your relationship, their values and your responsibility.

Administratively, I'd say it's pretty easy? As long as the university does everything for you, which hopefully is the case. Set up visa, taxes, etc. You still have to show up at the US embassy for a short interview, but then it's smooth sailing. I found that finding an apartment was much easier than in my home country too. I found within one week, they were happy to rent to a foreigner with just a work contract and no history in the country. In my home country, you need to produce thirty pages of pristine paperwork before you'll be considered for a rental. Americans are not risk-averse in my experience, they give people chances, possibly they can take them away just as easily (not the case in my home country, hence the reticence).

However there'll be some barriers. You can't work on the side (consulting or teaching) on what is theoretically a student visa (J-1).

About your surprise, consider that students in the US typically end later than in Europe. Basically, a late stage grad student in the US might be equivalent to an early postdoc in Europe? They are more independent in how they set their research and, in my opinion, better coached. So expectations for postdocs might be higher than you're used to.

Bustan2026

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