[adventured]

> As for innovation? US isn't even top 10 when it comes to Nobel prize per capita

Your per capita list is an epic compliment to the US.

The fact that the US is #15 per capita is extraordinary, given your list is comparing the US to top ten countries like East Timor, Saint Lucia, Luxembourg and Iceland, where if you get one or two you leap ahead of the entire world.

Among large population nations, only the UK and Germany rank higher, with Germany only slightly ahead. The UK for their part are far beyond everyone else on any reasonable comparison scale.

The US has five times the population of France and exceeds them on Nobels per capita. That is an amazing performance by the US.

The fact that the US is so massive and still ranks ahead of: the Netherlands, Belgium, Canada, Australia, Finland, New Zealand, Italy, Japan, Spain, Portugal, Greece, etc. - is similarly staggering.

The US has over three times the rate of Italy, nearly double the rate of Canada, and over five times the rate of Japan.

The US per capita rate is 46% higher than the EU.

I'm going to drop Saint Lucia, East Timor, Iceland and Luxembourg from the comparison list because it's beyond silly, they all have one Nobel and micro populations. On a more rational list, the US is #11, with an 11.7 rate per 10m people. A nearby comparison is Ireland with a 14.5 rate; Ireland has seven total, the US has 383 and roughly 70 times the population. Like I said, it's an epic compliment for the US to be so highly ranked on a list dominated by small populations. The US is the sole country over 100 million population until you get down to #35 Japan at a 2.2 rate; except for the UK, the top 10 is all under 10 million population.

[romanoderoma]

> extraordinary, given your list is comparing the US to top ten countries like East Timor, Saint Lucia, Luxembourg and Iceland

Compare that with the resources available and it will look much less extraordinary

It is extraordinary that countries with much less resources, much less competition and orders of magnitude smaller pool of talents to chose from (4 orders of magnitude in the case of Iceland, East Timor and Luxembourg), can rival the richest and most powerful country in the World in modern history

But let's look at the US noble prize winners

     19 born in Germany
     12 born in Canada
     11 born in United Kingdom
      7 born in Italy
      7 born in Russia
      6 born in China
      6 born in Austria
      4 born in India
      4 born in Hungary
      3 born in South Africa
      3 born in France
      2 born in Poland
      2 born in Netherlands
      2 born in Romania
      2 born in Japan
      2 born in Israel
      1 born in Venezuela
      1 born in Turkey
      1 born in Taiwan
      1 born in Switzerland
      1 born in Spain
      1 born in Norway
      1 born in New Zealand
      1 born in Mexico
      1 born in Korea
      1 born in Ireland
      1 born in Egypt
      1 born in Australia

for a grand total of 103 Nobel prizes won by foreigners

[readarticle]

for a grand total of 103 Nobel prizes won by US citizens*

Meaning not only does the US outperform in Nobel laureates as a massive nation at a per capita level, it’s simultaneously attracting even more.

[romanoderoma]

You have to understand two things

- as Mark Kastner said "these prizes are a lagging indicator. They show us what we were doing right decades ago"

- Much of the research that lead Joachim Frank, a German born chemist, to win the Nobel prize for chemistry in 2017 took place in Europe and it was based on base research that took place outside of the US. The trio who was appointed was formed by Jacques Dubochet from Switzerland, Richard Henderson from Scotland and Frank from Germany. Frank was affiliated with US institutions when he was nominated, hence the prize has been claimed by US. They are basically buying Nobel prize winners post facto.