[fennecfoxen]

> The next thought should be: why doesn't neo-liberal capitalism fix this problem?

You are the vehicle by which neo-liberal capitalism fixes the problem. By leaving academia to work for a firm directly, you are responding to a price signal sent by the industry, relaying that price signal to the academic labs.

You might object, this is slower than most price signals! That's because the university environment is somewhat insulated from the ordinary pressures of capitalism (and thus better able to exploit young research programmers).

[the_only_law]

> you are responding to a price signal sent by the industry, relaying that price signal to the academic labs.

Which means absolutely nothing unless a ton of other people do it as well. A handful of people here and there can be replaced.