
How to double science research - jseliger
http://www.johndcook.com/blog/2013/03/13/how-to-double-science-research/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheEndeavour+%28The+Endeavour%29
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jseliger
_universities could reduce the enormous bureaucracies created to manage
grants. This isn’t purely hypothetical. When Hillsdale College decided to
refuse all federal grant money, they found that the loss wasn’t nearly as
large as it seemed because so much of the grant money had been going to
administering grants._

This issue isn't limited to universities, either, and it's important to me
because I work for a consulting firm that does grant writing for nonprofit and
public agencies. One thing I find striking is how little funders understand
about how fundees respond to incentives and to funding requirements.

If funders understood more about the sheer amount of administrative hassle
they impose, and the costs of it (directly or indirectly: the money comes from
somewhere), I think we'd see something more like a "common application" for
many grant-funded projects.

(I've written much more about this issue here:
[http://blog.seliger.com/2012/03/25/why-fund-organizations-
th...](http://blog.seliger.com/2012/03/25/why-fund-organizations-through-
grant-applications-at-all) and elsewhere.)

