Sure, that doesn't help. Most scientists don't do it for the money though, so that doesn't have to be an issue per se. The barrier to entry for becoming a scientist, however, is extremely high and not filled with equal opportunity.

One example is a female friend of mine with two Master's degrees who's currently not getting paid a lot in a government job. She would love to do a PHD and start doing research in the areas she's been educated in and worked in, but she hardly gets invited to interviews and when she does, she never seems to get the job, because she lacks research experience. The longer she works outside of research, the less of a chance she gets to actually get hired for a research position.

I understand that there have to be high barriers to entry, because quality needs to be high, but I feel like the balance currently might not be right.

Believe it or not, scientists need to eat, want to own homes, have vacation, and buy things like everyone else. There's a selection bias in "scientists don't do it for money"--the scientists that don't do it for the money tend to be the most successful because they're willing to undercut their competition. They're the ones who will invest significant amounts of their life towards an area of research, spend their weekends and nights pursuing some goal, sometimes even put family second. They are the entrepreneurs of science.

There's a lot of other scientists who are just as skilled, may have just as good ideas, as so on. They view their work as work, enjoyable for some or just a job for others (though these are very few as by this point they just find something less stressful that pays).

So it's not that the lack of money doesn't help, it basically shapes the entire labor pool of scientists selecting for the most passionate, the ones who might not be making much over a small resturaunt manager when you normalize their time spent to comp. Skilled scientists who want a life and see other opportunities tend to leave science as it's high risk low reward and apply their skill elsewhere. It's a lot to science.

If you look at CS, the research community is almost starving as most leave for big tech or others that can comp 3-5x what academia can provide. I suspect big pharma is a hit the same.

> it doesn't pay enough

> Most scientists don't do it for the money though

Naturally, a field that doesn't pay well will fail to attract people who are motivated by money.