William J. Broad, New York Times
March 19, 2014
American science, long a source of national power and pride, is increasingly becoming a private enterprise. In
Washington, budget cuts have left the nation’s research complex
reeling. Labs are closing. Scientists are being laid off. Projects are
being put on the shelf, especially in the risky, freewheeling realm of
basic research. Yet from Silicon Valley to Wall Street, science
philanthropy is hot, as many of the richest Americans seek to reinvent
themselves as patrons of social progress through science research. The
result is a new calculus of influence and priorities that the
scientific community views with a mix of gratitude and trepidation. Read more
March 13, 2014
Paul Basken, Chronicle of Higher Education
A Congressional panel on Thursday approved legislation that would
flatten the budget of the National Science Foundation and revive past
attempts to tie the agency’s spending on research to a definable
economic payback.
The measure, a policy-setting bill for the NSF and the National
Institute of Standards and Technology, would give the NSF a budget in
the 2015 fiscal year of $7.28-billion, about 1.5 percent beyond its
current level of $7.17-billion. President Obama, in his 2015 budget proposed this month, suggested $7.3-billion, while House Democrats are seeking $7.52-billion.
Yet in a sign of future compromise before the bill reaches the
Democratic-controlled Senate, the Republican majority on the House
Science Subcommittee on Research and Technology accepted nine separate
Democratic amendments, including a partial retreat from plans to
severely cut the NSF’s budget for social-science research. Read more
Paul Basken, Chronicle of Higher Education
March 5, 2014
The Obama administration, constrained by spending caps imposed by
Congress, suggested on Tuesday a federal budget for 2015 that would mean
another year of cuts in the government’s spending on basic scientific
research.
The budget of the National Institutes of Health, the largest provider
of basic research money to universities, would be $30.4-billion, an
increase of just $200-million from the current year. After accounting
for inflation, that would be a cut of about 1 percent. Read more
