[open-science] Academic freedom, work for hire, and who is subsidizing whom?

[Nick Barnes]

On Tue, Dec 13, 2011 at 17:56, Heather Morrison <heatherm at eln.bc.ca> wrote:
> A limitation of the public funding argument is that in many cases public funding only covers some of the costs. For example, to become a grad student, one must first be a undergrad. There are still places where post-secondary education is fully subsidized, however partial or no subsidies seems to be more common. If a grad student is paying for their undergrad education (or perhaps still carrying debt), as well as paying tuition, while working on a research project, I would argue that it is the grad student who is funding the research. If grad students are to be told how to license their work on the basis that it is "publicly funding", I would advise grad students to say, okay where is the public funding?

Does an analogous argument apply to graduates working in the private
sector?  If not, why not?  Their work products require their skills
which are similarly based on their education, which someone (usually
the graduate or a government) has paid for.  Are they entitled to a
share of the work products based on that subsidy?  Or is it assumed
that their salary pays for their skills?
-- 
Nick Barnes, Climate Code Foundation, http://climatecode.org/