Brain from page A39

Since 1973, Israel's population doubled but
faculty positions declined.

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A40

April 3 • 2008

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University, considered one of the top
schools for his specialty, economic
theory.
Siegal said his choice was difficult
to make but ultimately came down
to being in the best place to begin his
career.
"Israel is not a central place he
said, "and when you are starting out,
exposure is important."
Siegal said ifs important to be near
one's peers when it comes to being
published in the right journals, getting
invited to important conferences and
ultimately receiving tenure.
At Northwestern, Siegel not only
earned a significantly higher salary
but also had a lighter teaching load
than in Israel — allowing him more
time for research.
Shraga Brosh, the president of the
Manufacturers Association of Israel,
blames the flight of some of Israel's
top minds to the government cuts in
the research-and-development bud-
gets.
Brosh made headlines earlier this
year when he announced that 25,000
high-tech workers had left Israel in
the past seven years to work for U.S.
companies. Researchers dismissed the
number as inflated, but the announce-
ment highlighted the sense that Israel
is in a crunch.

Economic Loss
The loss of human resources costs
Israel some $1.9 billion each year,
economists in Brosh's organization
estimated.
They are currently raising money to
provide stipends for returning Israelis
in the hope that a financial boost will
be another incentive to come back.
An Israeli working in the United
States, Gil Blander, helped found a
nonprofit organization called Bio-
Abroad that connects Israeli biologists
living overseas with work opportuni-
ties in Israeli academia and industry.
Blander, who did his post-doctoral
work in biology at MIT and is now
working at a biotech company in
Boston, founded the organization out
of frustration by a lack of information
about jobs and opportunities in Israel
for professionals abroad.
In the United States, Blander found
a "more comfortable place to do sci-
ence," but added that he and his wife,
who works for a high-tech firm, even-

tually plan to return to Israel.
The Israeli government recently
ramped up efforts to bring Israelis
back, offering tax incentives, organiz-
ing job fairs for Israelis abroad and
establishing relocation Web sites.

Fault Of Government?
Ben-David says it's not just salaries
that are sending Israelis overseas.
Citing the steep decline in available
positions at Israeli universities, he
faults the government and says budget
cuts are to blame.
Officials from the Finance Ministry,
which oversees the budgets of Israel's
seven universities, insist higher
education is a top national priority.
Approximately one-quarter of the
ministry's $7 billion education budget
goes to higher education, and academ-
ics were granted a 24.5 percent raise
through 2009 as part of the deal in
February that ended Israel's three-
month university strike.
Until the 1970s, Israel had about the
same academic positions per capita
as the United States, but since 1973
Israel's population has doubled while
the number of available faculty posi-
tions has declined, Ben-David said.
Eitan Rubin is among the Israelis
who have felt the overseas lure. He left
Israel for Harvard's Bioinformatics
Center for Genomics Research but,
ideologically committed to living in
Israel, returned to work at the National
Institute of Biotechnology in the
Negev, which is associated with Ben-
Gurion University
"Leaving America was very hard,
both professionally and to leave that
level of science Rubin said.
He worries now that because
less money is available in Israel for
research, he won't remain competitive
with his U.S. colleagues.
Another Israeli returnee, Shulamit
Levenberg, who took a post in bio-
engineering at the Technion after five
years doing post-doctoral work at MIT,
says she wishes more of her colleagues
were in Israel.
"Brainpower is one of the strengths
of our country, and it's a shame there
are not more possibilities for people
to come back:' she said. "They went
through a long process of study and
can really contribute. We are losing
them:'

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