
Trump, Congress approve largest U.S. research spending increase in a decade - onuralp
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/03/updated-us-spending-deal-contains-largest-research-spending-increase-decade
======
birken
I'll just note from a political perspective, Donald Trump threatened to veto
the final budget bill because of the totality of these spending increases. He
was not in favor of these increases.

In fact the budget Donald Trump proposed [1] mainly was massive increases in
military spending with sharp cuts to many domestic agencies (EPA -25%,
Education -5%), including many research agencies they don't agree with (like
the NOAA [2]).

But what happened is many Republicans in the freedom caucus refused to vote
for a budget that increased the debt by so much, so a compromise was required
as Democratic votes were going to be needed. So to vastly oversimplify,
Republicans wanted higher military spending, Democrats wanted higher domestic
spending, and the compromise was reached that everybody got everything and who
cares about the national debt. The bill actually passed in a very bipartisan
way, with 62% of republicans and 59% of democrats in the House voting for the
final bill, but with many of the "no" votes for different reasons (no DACA
solution, debt increase too much, not enough wall spending, etc).

So while these increases are good (if you happen to like R&D spending), they
aren't due to congress shifting their spending priorities, they are just due
to a massive increase in the debt.

1:
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/trump-...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2018/politics/trump-
budget-2019/?utm_term=.1b35d6134447)

2: [https://www.aip.org/fyi/2017/trump-budget-cuts-
noaa-16-slash...](https://www.aip.org/fyi/2017/trump-budget-cuts-
noaa-16-slashes-research-funding-even-deeper)

~~~
otalp
For all the talk of "fiscal conservatism", Reagan was the first post-war
president to drastically increase the national debt - he increased the debt by
186% due to insane deficit spending.[1] After Bush Sr. added another 1.5
trillion, Clinton was the most fiscally conservative president in modern
times, adding only 32% to the debt after 8 years. GWB of course again
increased the debt by 101% and also fuelled a trillion dollar war which
destabilised the entire middle east.

Obama, facing the biggest recession in a century(which requires government
spending to stimulate the economy) only increased the debt 74% after 8 years.
The amount he added to the debt over 8 years is likely to be surpassed by
Trump in just 4.

If there's one relatively fiscal conservative party in the US, it's definitely
not the GOP. Yet the media just takes at their word and continues to associate
them with fiscal conservatism.

[1] - [https://www.thebalance.com/us-debt-by-president-by-dollar-
an...](https://www.thebalance.com/us-debt-by-president-by-dollar-and-
percent-3306296)

~~~
ckinnan
It is misleading to fully assign spending outcomes to the sitting president--
Congress has far more control over spending than the White House. Clinton was
anti-deficit but he also had the most conservative Congress in modern times
after 1994 sending him appropriations bills. Obama had a similar dynamic after
2010. In both cases GOP Congresses imposed hard spending caps-- in fact, in
1994 they even clawed back spending from 1993.

~~~
dragontamer
The difference is that the Republicans use "fiscal conservatism" to really
mean "Current President we don't like shouldn't get as much money".

And then they give all the money to the Republican Presidents when they come
into power (see Tax cuts, which I personally consider to be lavish spending)

There's definitely a large group of Americans (likely a minority, but still a
large group) who genuinely care about the debt, deficit, and balancing the
budget. But there's really no major powers in Washington who actually do care.
(And the few Senators who do care are nutjobs IMO. Its difficult to find a
"reasonable" deficit hawk who doesn't believe in "Gold Standard " or other
crap)

I'm talking about simple, and reasonable ways to get rid of the deficit here:
increase taxes slightly, reduce spending where we can. Is it really that hard?
Alas, no one I'm aware of is for both increasing taxes and cutting spending.

Apparently, cutting spending puts you in the group of nutjobs who believe that
cutting taxes magically increases revenues due to "economic growth".

Increasing taxes (which is championed by the left) also puts you in with the
Bernie Bros who then spend all the money made on free college education for
everyone, and other such projects we can't afford.

~~~
otalp
Personally I think there may be better ways to spend money, but it's
interesting that tuition-free college, which is the norm in europe, is
considered something the US "can't afford" while a 700 billion dollar increase
in military spending is passed without blinking an eye by people who've spent
8 years complaining about deficit.

The huge money sink in the US budget is undoubtedly the military. After the
current increase the US probably spends more on military than the next 13 or
14 countries combined. If that can be reduced to spending about 2.5x what
China spends(still overkill considering the allies the US has) then you have
about 350 billion a year to either spend or reduce the deficit with. More than
enough to eliminate child hunger, healthcare problems and infrastructure
issues.

~~~
dragontamer
There are other cultural issues stopping tuition-free college in the USA. At
best, tuition-free community college is the best we might be able to hope for.

Case in point: Europeans don't have for-profit companies extracting wealth
from uneducated Americans.

There's fundamental problems to the US's education system at play here. We
can't throw money at the problem and hope for it to work. We have to
culturally fix those issues.

~~~
otalp
Tuition was free for in-state students during America's peak post war years in
California and other places. It's not like it's completely alien to America.
Nobody is advocating "throwing money" at the issue but you can't just sit
around waiting for cultural change without doing anything about it.

~~~
dragontamer
State-based tuition would work out in America, but case in point on how awful
our educational infrastructure is:

National Accreditation is basically a joke. Only regional accreditation
matters. If people actually want to have "free college for everyone in the
USA", step one would be to actually DEFINE a college education on the national
level.

Which the USA does NOT have yet. We are very far away from the point of "sink
money into this project". Ever talk education in the USA? How did "Common
Core" do? The political culture is incredibly sensitive and paranoid about
education changes.

Just think about how such a "free tuition" project would work. You'd have to
have a national team standardize a curriculum. You'd have to then inspect
various colleges to make sure they're up to standard. The ones that aren't up
to standard lose federal money (aka: free tuition money), so it would be a
death-spell for any school who fails.

Its not compatible with US Culture. US Citizens are too particular about how
their children are taught, and would never accept people from far away telling
them that... well... Thomas Jefferson is a founding father
([https://thinkprogress.org/texas-board-of-education-cuts-
thom...](https://thinkprogress.org/texas-board-of-education-cuts-thomas-
jefferson-out-of-its-textbooks-477678f05e7f/)) or that the Earth is older than
6000 years old, or that Radioactive dating works.

Education barely even is a money problem. Its mostly political. Frankly
though, I'd prefer if we fixed our High Schools first. Clearly a high school
education isn't enough for most jobs anymore.

------
learc83
Here is Trump's tweet on what he thinks of the domestic spending increase.

"Got $1.6 Billion to start Wall on Southern Border, rest will be forthcoming.
Most importantly, got $700 Billion to rebuild our Military, $716 Billion next
year...most ever. _Had to waste money on Dem giveaways_ in order to take care
of military pay increase and new equipment." (emphasis mine)

~~~
ModernMech
Exactly. When it's money spent on warships and nuclear bombs, it's money well
spent. When it's (comparatively much less) money spent on education, research,
NASA, PBS, NEA, meals on wheels etc. Well now, let's not get crazy with
spending.

~~~
devmunchies
You summarized the tweet with the same amount of words.

Anyway, I don't think he cares about it as much as you think. He knows who his
voters are. He also is aware that it makes people like you irritated so that
you keep talking about him, which keeps him in the news.

~~~
ModernMech
I wasn't summarizing; I was reiterating.

~~~
ModernMech
I don't understand what you're driving at. An echo would contain no new
information. There's clearly more information in my comment than the original
post. That you're upset I did so in the same number of words as a tweet is
confusing to me.

~~~
ModernMech
It's a Hacker News bug apparently. There was no reply link under your name,
and now there is. But there is no reply link under the reply to which I'm now
replying (now _that 's_ confusing)

[https://imgur.com/a/5kMTA](https://imgur.com/a/5kMTA)

~~~
sangnoir
It's not an HN bug - it's a cool-down feature meant to defuse heated flamewar
threads by reducing rate-of-fire.

~~~
ModernMech
Ah that makes sense. In all my time on HN I haven't seen that occur before.

------
melling
How would the world be different if the US spent more on research over the
past 50 years? If the Human Genome Project had been completed in 1993 instead
of 2003, for example, would our knowledge be 10-20 years ahead of where we are
now?

Knowledge we would be discovering 2038 might be discovered this year. If there
is some sort of Moore’s Law for investment in research, by 2050, we’d have
technology from 2150 at the current pace?

~~~
ModernMech
> If the Human Genome Project had been completed in 1993 instead of 2003

Could the project have been completed in 1993 with infinite funding? Just
taking into account computing power put into the project, it was exponentially
greater in 2003, so perhaps in 1993 it wasn't enough. Maybe it would have
taken until 2003 no matter what, as the limiting factor wasn't money but
something else.

~~~
melling
The idea is that we shift the entire timeline of discovery by a few years at
first then by more as time passes. I didn’t mean to imply that we spend large
amounts of money on one project to get it done earlier.

Simply, that we spend more on research, in general, then would we reach the
ability to solve the Human Genome Project earlier. I picked this project
randomly. The LHC and Higgs could be another.

------
radicalbyte
This is great news and all, but I thought that the administration wanted to
slash research spending? Did they change plans, or is this how US politics
works.

~~~
deciplex
This is the budget that Trump threatened to veto and whined and complained
about before he signed, and the one they're writing articles about the
Democrats getting heaps of stuff they wanted in it. I don't think it should be
taken as an indication of stuff Trump wants, and to some extent the same goes
for the GOP.

~~~
maxxxxx
It definitely shows that his "deal making" abilities are not as great as he
thinks.

------
dspillett
Where does this leave things relative to previous years? Does it completely
counter any cuts made in recent times? Counter them over-all but still leave
some areas under-/un- funded compared to a previous state of affairs?

~~~
aaavl2821
For NIH, this is massive. NIH lost 19% funding from 2003 (when it was at $40B
/ year) to 2015. Small gains the last couple years combined with this massive
increase _almost_ erases that (2018 budget is $38B).

Pretty amazing

~~~
no_identd
And when adjusted for inflation?

~~~
ModernMech
Their 2003 budget of $40B should be $54B in 2018 dollars.

------
tlb
DARPA isn't mentioned, which I consider one of the most effective agencies. Is
its budget elsewhere, like DOD?

~~~
maxxxxx
I worked in a startup founded by DARPA people for a while and my impression
was that DARPA is often used to funnel money to well connected friends. They
do interesting things but it doesn't seem very efficient.

~~~
lazerpants
My experience is quite different. DARPA is a good agency to work with for
engineering seed funding in academic research. They're willing to fund some
interesting ideas that other groups think are too risky.

------
cvaidya1986
Hopefully everyone sees this as the positive news it is. US research is it’s
greatest asset.

------
mtgx
This is all coming out of increased debt.

~~~
nsnick
The National Debt: Why Fret Over Something That Doesn't Exist?

[https://realmoney.thestreet.com/articles/10/25/2016/national...](https://realmoney.thestreet.com/articles/10/25/2016/national-
debt-why-fret-over-something-doesnt-exist)

~~~
liberte82
Didn’t Stalin declare all debt with the USSR null and void? I wouldn’t be
shocked to see Trump do something like this one day.

~~~
ska
That would be a pretty good way to crash the economy, it's not a move to pull
unless you are already in bad shape.

Also bear in mind a lot of that debt is held by Americans...

~~~
liberte82
Yeah I don’t mean it’d happen tomorrow, but if things in the world continued
to get a lot crazier.

