  Numerous EU documents praise the excellence of EU research without empirical
evidence and against academic studies. We investigated research performance in
two fields of high socioeconomic importance, advanced technology and basic
medical research, in two sets of European countries, Germany, France, Italy,
and Spain (GFIS), and the UK, the Netherlands, and Switzerland (UKNCH). Despite
historical and geographical proximity, research performance in GFIS is much
lower than in UKNCH, and well below the world average. Funding from the
European Research Council (ERC) greatly improves performance both in GFIS and
UKNCH, but ERC-GFIS publications are less cited than ERC-UKNCH publications. We
conclude that research performance in GFIS and in other EU countries is
intrinsically low even when it is generously funded. The technological and
economic future of the EU depends on improving research, which requires
structural changes in research policy within the EU, and in most EU countries.
