Basic Scientific Research: How It Works and Why It Matters

I decided to write this in light of recent government policies that will devastate the world's greatest ecosystem for conducting scientific research. Notably, the reduction in indirect costs to 15% on NIH grants, the firing of thousands of employees from NIH and NHS, and mass layoffs and an expected 50% reduction in the NSF budget. Most people I know have a limited understanding of how science is primarily conducted, how it is paid for, and why it matters. If you feel that describes you, please keep reading. (The specifics of indirect costs, why they matter, and why 15% is dangerously low are discussed at the end.)

Science is a method for investigating how the natural world works. It is an endless cycle of making measurements, testing them against your current understanding of the system you are studying, updating your model based on the data, rinse, repeat. For all intents and purposes, we colloquially refer to basic science as research that does not have immediate and obvious economic value to the point where it can be supported by existing private sector financial vehicles. In other words, if the scientist solves their problem and the result is not expected to produce revenue in the short term (roughly 5-10 years), no one would pay for that scientist to do this work. Thus, basic science is primarily subsidized by the government... that is right, your hard earned taxpayer dollars (and to a small degree, charitable donations, though these donations are sometimes motivated by tax incentives).

If you support this administration, you may read this and think, okay, well if it is not expected to have real world impact, who needs it? Why should I be paying for it? Why should the NIH have a 46 billion dollar budget? Why should the NSF fund research in quantum gravity when the deficit is over 36 trillion dollars? This is a real concern. Funding for basic science to the NIH and NSF is about 1.1% of yearly tax revenue or 0.77% of government spending in 2024.

The reason this funding is crucial is because basic science is the primary economic motor of our economy. The internet, ChatGPT, antibiotics, cancer treatments, all of these things are a direct product of basic scientific research conducted within the university system. mRNA vaccine technology was conceived and demonstrated by 20 years of research beginning in the 90s. Twenty years of research in the field of non-convex optimization led to the formulation of neural networks that have enabled the AI revolution. The Nobel Prize for artificial intelligence was given to John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton for their work while university professors, not Sam Altman and Elon Musk, whose companies have contributed little to the core algorithms and mathematics. The university research system is this country's strongest asset and the reason we have the world's leading higher education system. It attracts the brightest minds from all over the world to come to the United States under the assumption that they will get to participate in cutting edge research. In fact, over half the PhD students in STEM fields are international. These students are not going back home either (to the extent our immigration policy permits them to stay). That is because our cutting edge research system produces cutting edge industries that are aided by their close proximity to these institutions and the trained scientists the system produces.

But maybe you would still like to argue, well maybe there is waste in the system. We should make sure taxpayer dollars are being well spent. This brings us the specifics, namely the slashing in indirect costs from the country average of about 35% to 15%. When a professor wants to do science, they write a grant to the NIH. If this grant awards them 1 million dollars, the scientist receives the money and the NIH pays an additional 35% of that money to the university for indirect costs. This sounds opaque and like it could be going towards funding other programs. It is partly opaque and a reasonable critique could be better documentation of how this money is spent (though that would require more bureaucracy). The primary way this money is being spent is for essential costs such as buildings, electricity, lab equipment, and administration that are absolutely essential for enabling research. Elite institutions in cities like Boston, San Francisco, and New York often quote higher prices for indirect costs because land is more expensive and facilities are top notch. Reducing this spending to 15% will cripple the ability of all universities to support science, and disproportionately so to the world's leading institutions. It will, and is already, leading to the closure of research institutions, hiring freezes for scientists, and will bring cancer research and other important future discoveries to a grinding halt. Even if the policies last only 4 years, and even if the damage to the system is not long term (which is unlikely), that 4 years of progress could very well be the difference between your loved ones getting the treatment they need for a fatal disease.

At the end of the day, the country is clearly in a tight spot financially. This warrants both reconsideration and review of how we spend money and whether we are collecting the proper amount via tax policy. However, there is a difference between a responsible examination of waste in money being spent on research, and an overnight cut to 15% after 24 hours of consideration. These cuts and others are already having real impacts on the system. Even if you support this administration, please do not support the hasty and extreme cuts to basic science research if you would like to remain living in a country where our higher education and industry leads the world.