Could Today’s Katalin Karikó Come to America?

The U.S. immigration system makes it too costly and time consuming for highly skilled immigrants to live and work here.

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Katalin Karikó speaks during a press conference on October 11, 2023, in Budapest, Hungary. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine 2023 along with Drew Weissman for their research that led directly to the first mRNA vaccines to fight COVID-19. (Photo by Janos Kummer/Getty Images)

Dear Capitolsiters,

As I noted last week in the links, medical researchers Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman have won the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries related to the mRNA vaccines used to battle COVID-19. This news is good and overdue for many reasons, the biggest one of course being that their breakthrough undoubtedly saved many lives and helped restart the global economy following one of the worst pandemics in modern history. Somewhere lower on that list of reasons (but still important) is the fact that the award shows yet again that the United States—where both Karikó and Weissman reside and did much of their groundbreaking research—continues to have an outsize influence on global science and innovation, thanks in no small part (as we’ve discussed) to brilliant, doggedly-determined immigrants like Katalin Karikó. 

As much as I want to cheer the award and its significance, however, the policy dork in me isn’t really in a rah rah mood. That’s because if Katalin Karikó’s inspiring story were written today, it very well could’ve happened outside the United States—or maybe not at all.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    This tracks with my experience. Various friends and acquaintances have been unable to immigrate here or have struggled mightily and only eventually got approved. People don’t realize how many engineers and scientists our system is pushing away.

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    Charlie

    A few years ago at a faculty meeting we went around the room and I discovered that I was the only one in the room whose parents were born in the US. I am a real oddball in academia today in that all eight of my great grandparents were born in the US. My wife, however, was born in Mexico.

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    Joe Lancaster

    More confirmation for my belief that we live in the stupidest times possible 🤦🏼‍♂️ . . .

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  4. Natty Bumpo

    Good piece as usual Scott. I will not claim any particular knowledge or experience with immigration, but I recognize the historical debt America owes to our immigrants, and the current demographic need for rejuvenating additions to our national enterprise.

    I agree that there is no real connection between the Southern Border Crises and the need for skilled workers/scientists/inventors, many of which may need to come from immigration. While I have been no big supporter of the border wall, I recognize that it appears to represent a political necessity to get anyone to deal with the policy, administrative and capacity mess we have with legal immigration. For America to be Great (Again), we need the best resources, especially of people.

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  5. G.Mcd

    A huge part of the H1B problem is IT companies cramming the existing channel with people with questionable qualifications in order to replace a 20 person internal IT department at a client company with 2-3 H1Bs who serve as liaisons between the end-client company and 100 minimally skilled coders back in India. It’s called the “onshore-offshore model” and it’s a clear example of the fact that our companies increasingly see IT as a commodity and not as a true specialty occupation. These people are in direct competition with actual engineers and scientists and physicians in the H1B lottery.

    The Trump admin attempted to curb some of these abuses to clear the path for true workers in specialty occupations but did so with blinding incompetence, without anything approaching the proper notice under the Administrative Procedure Act. The baby was utterly thrown out with the bath water in the “ITServe Alliance v. Cissna” settlement and the channel-stuffing continues unabated.

    CATO’s game completely leaves out the most common immigration path used by people with promising academic potential: STUDENT VISAS. Scholars with advanced degrees from US schools get preferential odds in the H1B lottery. If the H1B petitioning company is a university, they do not have to face the lottery at all. The student visa holder in a STEM field can legally work under Curricular Practical Training while he is studying, and use Optional Practical Training for up to 3 years after completing his degree. This gives them plenty of preferential bites at the H1B apple.

    Our immigration system is surely broken, and H1B dependent companies who stuff the H1B lottery are among those who reap a concentrated benefit from it.

    One of the things that makes it hard to fix our system is the existence of a generous welfare state. Does CATO support the government actually enforcing the public charge deportation law?

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      WKDawson

      Yeah, this seems like another irksome scam. It is a common line to say "We cannot find any Americans" (I have the impression they don't look very hard), and, in the process, they create an environment where Americans don't get the training, and so it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Moreover, the H1Bs know that if they lose that job, they have to go home, so they are willing to put up with bad bosses, and crappy pay. Again, because they can pay far less, they also have a further incentive not to look very hard for Americans or encourage them to learn these fields. Again, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

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      Charlie

      The US has a MUCH less generous welfare state than pretty much every other first world country. Even Mexico has universal healthcare. People don't come to the US for welfare.

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    WKDawson

    I don't have any objection per se about your point on immigration. The immigration system in the US is just horrible and anything __but__"family-values" oriented. I sometimes wonder why anyone is willing to endure the process.

    However, yeah ... I know. here goes ... ... I wonder why it is that economic strategists seem to think that the only source of creative ideas comes from outside the US. We have 360 million people here and we depend upon a "savior" from outside?

    Kareko endured what many Americans endure in the graduate school machine, at least those who worked their way from some varying degree of hardscrabble background. Generally, whether you are an American or a foreigner, the graduate school meat grinder does not favor anyone who falls into Kareko's situation ___as___ a researcher. The main difference is that people like Kareko are even more vulnerable (and maybe this is now even worse).

    The thing is, any real research, anything that might actually yield a breakthrough, be that medicine, technology, or whatever, typically many many years have to go into that. An idea might be instantly obvious, but as Kareko learned, the devil is in the details. If you read the history of any _genuine_ innovations (not Door Dash, FB, Twitter), many decades were needed before the significance was recognized. That simple expression "z = x + iy" sat in a musty archive in Amsterdam for 80 years before a librarian realized that it might be of value to deMoive. Everything in America now (with the possible exception of pharmaceuticals) is short-term; 6 months, one year, maybe at best two. You cannot schedule innovation. It is like the spirit of God; no one knows where it comes or where it goes. Most of the time, even the best of us cannot see clearly until it falls right on top of us.

    The purported "noble field" of academia is anything but. I think maybe because "class" does not factor in __as much__ in the US as it does in other places in the world, creative individuals stand a better chance in the US than in many other places in the world, but I feel you are looking at a small part of a far bigger problem. This pseudo-professionalism that dominates our thinking about research and innovation is just myth and nonsense.

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      Charlie

      Americans don't want to go to graduate school anymore. Long hours hard work and much less reward than for other fields. And we have politicians trashing academia and promoting junk science.

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        WKDawson

        Yeah, certainly, the reward seems pretty paltry. You really have to like learning and really want to do something because you'll get little help or encouragement from the system. Maybe it has always largely been that way, but there was a brief period of fleeting sunshine somewhere in the '60s and trickling off by the '80s. Still, one wonders how it came to this.

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  7. R. James

    What a bunch of nonsense. The US is the most welcoming country in the world. It lets in over 1 million legal immigrants a year, which is far more than the 2nd most immigrant friendly country. Not to mention the 2.76 million illegal immigrants allowed into the country last year. Spare us the handwringing.

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      Pbanuski

      The most welcoming... sure if you mean that we're basically enormous @**holes, but everyone else in the world is an even bigger one. I think our immigration system needs overhaul, and a big part of that has to be security but if you go through that Green Card Game and don't think we need to make the legal process easier on people, I think you're nuts.

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      Billy.Faires

      Lincicome: Here are charts and data and facts.

      R.James: What a bunch of poppycock! Quitcher whinin' with all those stoopid... facts!

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  8. Bigdonmck

    Fantastic article. One of your best.
    Open the doors to the inventor class ( after vetting them ). We want the best and brightest. Let's go get them.
    I love legal immigration. And all the cultural influences it provides. It's the illegal immigration and stupid immigration barriers America puts up to prevent improving our country.

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  9. MLE

    America continues to depend on immigrants on every level.

    Both my father and my father-in-law escaped from Communist countries, came to America, and through hard work, both eventually became doctors. Every one of their children has a graduate degree and a love for the dream of America.

    Congress, do your job!

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  10. Kittyecws

    My mother’s family immigrated from Denmark in the early 1900s. Thankfully, it was much easier then, although not for all groups. Her father’s picture is displayed at Iowa State University for his contributions to farming. He has a hall named for him in his city of residence, also for his contributions to 4H and FFA. My uncle volunteered for the Marines and lost his life in the Pacific in WWII. Before that, he was a delegate from ISU to the Borden exhibit at the NY World’s Fair. My mother had three children. Two taught in public schools for over 30 years. Her son was a Medical Doctor. Her grandchildren are a school psychologist, a district judge, a former Senate and White House aide, and a construction engineer. Her family has contributed a lot to this country. Funny how that works down through the generations.

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