[mistrial9]

sort-of yes.. for the last decades, there have been a steady stream of college students who want to make change for the environment (in the West, at least). There have been far more trained and qualified young graduates than there are jobs. Now, we see the latest evolution of this story arc -- not only are the graduates left to fend for themselves by the US Federal Govt and others, but the few jobs that did become available are gone, and those that had stable careers by getting one of the few jobs, are being fired.

There is an embarrassing trend at the US EPA for example, to get interns and volunteers to do some official work, with no real way to transition to full time with job security and health insurance. This is partly due to the unending stream of applicants, despite few positions.

So from this context, rebuilding research means .. what? Both institutional knowledge store and authoritative titled positions. After some advances in data management by Google and some other commercial players, it is not clear what role Federal science had anyway, from this desk.

[DiogenesKynikos]

Your complaints about there being more graduates than jobs in academia is tangential to the fact that the Trump administration is effectively ending climate science in the US. Without federal funding, research will stop, and academics will leave for industry. The research community will cease to exist, and will have to be rebuilt from scratch if funding is ever turned back on.

[mistrial9]

no - I meant jobs in Federal science mostly, but that applies to academia and also corporate jobs. Basically, prevention and cleanup do not "make money" and therefore, jobs are scarce.