Point of no returns: researchers are crossing a threshold in the fight for funding
Summary
Gerald Schweiger discusses how the growing competition for research grants can reach a tipping point — the Szilard point — where the total cost of applying, reviewing and administrating grant schemes equals or exceeds the value of the awards themselves. Using the EU Horizon Europe call “GenAI for Africa” as a worked example (€5 million pot, ~215 applications, expected funding for only two projects), he shows that application costs per consortium can be substantial and that, in extreme cases, the process wastes more resources than it distributes. Schweiger situates this problem within metascience, questioning how current funding practices shape research behaviour, risk-taking and fairness.
Key Points
- The Szilard point is the threshold at which applying for grants costs as much as (or more than) the grants themselves.
- Competition is the predominant method for allocating research funds, but it may not be efficient or fair when funding is scarce.
- Horizon Europe’s GenAI for Africa call (€5M) drew ~215 submissions, with an anticipated success rate under 1%, illustrating extreme inefficiency.
- Simulation-based estimates use inputs such as time spent by coordinators and partners, consortium size and hourly labour costs to quantify application overheads.
- High application costs are borne by applicants (time), reviewers (effort) and administrators (process), and can discourage high-risk, high-reward research.
- The author urges rethinking funding mechanisms to reduce wasted effort and better support valuable science and researcher wellbeing.
Context and relevance
This piece matters to researchers, research managers and funders because it quantifies a familiar pain: hypercompetition for grants that drains time and diverts effort from doing research. It ties into ongoing debates in metascience about incentives, reproducibility and research integrity, and flags a growing policy problem as success rates fall and consortia become larger and more complex. The article connects trend data (consortium sizes, person-days per proposal) to concrete policy outcomes and ethical concerns about who pays the hidden costs of peer review and administration.
Why should I read this?
If you’re a researcher, lab leader or funder — this explains why chasing grants sometimes feels like running on a hamster wheel. Schweiger runs the numbers so you don’t have to, showing where the system eats its own tail and why that should freak you out (in a useful way). Short, sharp and directly relevant if you want to argue for smarter funding or simply reclaim some time for actual science.