How sky-high AI pay warps science

In a new piece for Nature, Nathan Sanders and Bruce Schneier argue that scientific institutions (including technology firms) should stop offering exorbitant salaries to secure the best 'tech talent.' They suggest that this move - including Meta's offering one researcher a four year, $250 million compensation package - disincentivizes academic research in technological domains. In part, companies' hiring practices reflect a "myth of lone genius" that overlooks the cooperativity of scientific practice and places too much control in the hands of single actors. 

Sanders and Schneier propose an alternative vision, "urg[ing] leaders of scientific institutions to reject the growing pay inequality rampant in the upper echelons of AI research. Instead, they should compete for talent on a different dimension: the integrity of their missions and the equitableness of their institutions,"