It is what you make of it - Avis employé Research Assistant MIT

Amazing work environment, supportive colleagues, good benefits.

Current federal funding hurts MIT staffing

High quality core facilities and well resourced labs. Countless brilliant colleagues who can serve as mentors and collaborators

Students and Postdocs are expensive due to high overhead, so unreasonably high productivity is often expected compared to other institutions. PIs are typically stretched very thin. Most departments/labs are very space limited which makes it harder to do safe and productive research.