National Institutes of Health weighs pay hike for postdocs

The US National Institutes of Health is weighing steps to boost pay for postdoctoral researchers, generating both encouragement and warnings that the increase likely will fall far short of the need.

The NIH’s advisory committee to the director – the agency’s official sounding board of biomedical experts – has put forth an initiative that would set annual salaries for NIH-funded postdocs at $70,000 (£55,000), a 24 per cent gain over the current minimum.

The plan also would improve other benefits in such areas as healthcare and childcare, while limiting total postdoctoral eligibility to five years to help move such scientists along in their careers.

The idea, its advocates say in outlining the details to NIH leadership, is to treat postdocs as accomplished professionals who need early-career mentoring and experience, while reducing the tendency among universities to treat them as a type of long-term labour force.

“The current system is not serving the needs of most postdocs,” said Shelley Berger, a professor of biology at the University of Pennsylvania who co-led the NIH advisory panel’s study group on postdoctoral training.

The advisory committee generally works in a supportive manner with the NIH, although the agency said it could give no timeline on when its director, Monica Bertagnolli, would act on the matter.

The US has more than 70,000 scientists working in postdoctoral positions across academia, government and industry. As with many early-career academics, they are seeking professional experience while often coping with low pay and status.

A survey a year ago by the US National Postdoctoral Association showed overwhelming majorities acknowledging a list of problems with their positions, including low pay, poor job security and workplace culture, unclear job expectations and career pathways, and stresses due to visa status.

The ideas put forth by the NIH advisory committee are welcome, said Neal Sweeney, a postdoctoral researcher in molecular biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz who serves as president of the union that represents postdocs and academic researchers across the California system. They “are thoughtful and important and address many of the critical factors impacting the postdoc community”, Dr Sweeney said.

The NIH policy is especially important, said Kevin Burgio, who is just finishing a postdoctoral job at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, because the NIH’s size means that its rules for paying grant-funded employees are often applied by universities across all their postdoctoral staff.

But increasing annual pay to a minimum of $70,000 probably doesn’t solve the affordability challenges facing many postdocs, Dr Burgio said. “If anything, it’s just kind of a cost-of-living and inflation adjustment” after years of no increases in many places, he said.

And salary levels aren’t necessarily the most important element of the postdoc experience that needs attention, Dr Burgio said. One often-overlooked area involves the tendency among postdocs to need to find new positions every year or two. Given the logistical difficulties, universities could make a major contribution by routinely providing assistance with housing and moving, he said.

Universities also should do a lot more, Dr Burgio said, to ensure that their professors remember the educational and training element of the postdoc role. The goal of the postdoc experience is “so that you’re competitive for your next job, and not necessarily to come in so that an assistant professor who is close to tenure can pump out those last five or six papers, so that they can get tenure”, he said.

paul.basken@timeshighereducation.com