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Comment by gnicholas | Hacker News Reader

What I couldn't tell was whether the "scientific advisors" are FTEs or some other role. It would take a lot for someone to give up a government job/pension, so three resignations of that nature would be incredible. But if these are just part-time consultants, the statement would be less notable.

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These are outside advisors, probably about 1/2 of them or more are academics as well as patient advocates, etc. They maybe paid some amount, but its not their primary income source.

Government STEM positions tend to be under paid vs the private sector. A lot of these people are taking a pay cut because they want to serve the greater good or work on an interesting problem.

It depends on the position, TE are probably less than tech sector, but salary for PhDs in basic sciences are great in government (ie, biology PhD starting at gs12/13 is $120-150k).

So if you want to do “science” then a government job is likely one of the highest paid jobs you can get.

You may have misread the pay schedule. You'd have to be a GS14 in San Francisco to make $150k. In most of the country a GS12-qualified biologist would only bring in six figures at the highest stepping. Good universities and national labs (contractors, not DOE employees!) pay way better.

Yes, you’re right and I overestimated the pay. But it’s still good. It does vary by location [0], but is still good compared to universities, I’m not sure about National labs. For example, the first regional pay table for Albany has gs13s starting at $93k and topping out at $121k [1] and San Francisco starts at $112k and tops out at $146k [2].

[0] https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/salaries...

[1] https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/salaries...

[2] https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/salaries...

If it's a fake drug that's been priced at a level to break American health care [1], they could potentially be this kind of employee that actually care or perhaps they just considered the corruption too obvious even for the FDA and wanted to clear themselves of charges.

[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/06/aduhelm-dr...

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