It is difficult for us to to the full grok how much our universe changed on September 11. The challenges that we now face may non be that different from the challenges we faced a twelvemonth ago. but our consciousness of these challenges has changed dramatically. As a consequence everything we deal with is different. This chapter discusses the new force per unit areas on the federal budget. particularly for scientific discipline. and the challenges presented by the altering demographics. I besides discuss how attempts to progress scientific discipline must alter and specifically how schemes to increase the resources available for scientific enquiry must alter if we are to keep impulse.

New Pressures on the Federal Budget since September 11

The federal authorities today faces a diminution in resources at the exact minute that it besides faces a dramatic addition in the demands for those re- beginnings. That puts us all in a hard place.

The U. S. economic system slowed last twelvemonth. cut downing grosss to the federal exchequer. Recovery is lukewarm and long-run. This state of affairs will impact grosss non merely in FY 2001 and FY 2002 but likely in FY 2003 as good. Growth from a lower base produces less gross.

The impact that the economic system has had on grosss was earnestly compounded by alterations in the federal revenue enhancement jurisprudence that were adopted last summer. The new revenue enhancement jurisprudence does non by itself explain the dramatic reversal from financial excess to triple-digit shortages in one twelvemonth. but it was a major subscriber and it will gnaw the federal revenue enhancement base by larger and larger sums over the following 10 old ages. This revenue enhancement measure will be the authorities about $ 100 billion in the coming financial twelvemonth. Grosss lost to that measure will transcend a one-fourth of a trillion dollars a twelvemonth by the terminal of the decennary. But the diminution in available grosss is no more dramatic than the increased and pressing demands for authorities action brought approximately by the onslaughts of September 11. At the really clip our capacity to finance existing authorities duties was being eroded. a figure of new and really expensive challenges were thrust upon us.

We have had important additions in defense mechanism disbursement. We are now sing the 3rd auxiliary budget for defense mechanism in less than nine months. What is non good known is that the Administration has non told us the full costs of September 11 with regard to disbursement on defense mechanism. home- land security. and foreign aid.

The $ 14 billion that the President late requested for the Department of Defence ( DOD ) will non cover operations through the balance of this financial twelvemonth. Payments for National Guard and Reserve call-ups that have already taken topographic point are understated by about $ 2 billion. When the seem- ingly tremendous addition of $ 45 billion ( 13 per centum ) in Pentagon disbursement that the President has requested for following twelvemonth is compared to what we will truly pass in the current twelvemonth the existent addition is much smaller. In add-on. because difficult determinations to phase out lower precedence or unnecessary arm systems have been delayed. it is rather likely that the Pentagon will necessitate another addition before the terminal of FY 2003. And this assumes nil with regard to action against Iraq or other possible struggles that the White House is now sing.

But the addition in defense mechanism disbursement is merely one budgetary impact of September 11. It is likely easier to bring forth a list of authorities duties that were non affected by September 11 than those that were. And these duties must be met with increased cost. For illustration. we have ordered immense alterations to protect air hoses from terrorist onslaughts. But most of the measures for those alterations have non been paid. We have hired more imposts inspectors and more Federal Bureau of Investigation particular agents. We have besides begun indurating federal edifices against bombs. sources. and chemicals. But we are non yet at degrees that most analysts feel we will necessitate. We are merely in the beginning stages.

Infrastructure Needs

We live in an asymmetrical universe. Our tremendous military might has left those who object to our policies. values. or civilization with few options for rebelliousness. Osama bin Laden. ( whether he is populating or dead ) has provided such individuals with a scheme for levelling the playing field. Defending ourselves against these terrorist schemes will necessitate a retooling of virtually every facet of our physical and economic substructure. We will necessitate monolithic alterations in our information systems. For illustration. the blessing of a visa by our State Department consular services should be instantly available to jurisprudence enforcement bureaus. including the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the U. S. Customs Service. We will besides necessitate extremist alterations in the manner our whole international transportation and port systems work. We will necessitate much more sensitive agencies of observing radiological. biological. and chemical jeopardies. And we need to destruct tremendous measures of atomic and biological arms or happen much better ways to protect them.

Covering with Strategic Voids

There are still other expensive deductions to September 11. Before the autumn of the Berlin Wall about every square inch of land on this Earth was contested by the world powers. But after the autumn of the Soviet Empire. a big part of the Earth became of no “apparent” strategic concern to anyone. Some foreign policy analysts called these countries “strategic nothingnesss. ” In many cases these countries have no effectual authorities or cardinal author- ity. They are engendering evidences for terrorists. drug sellers. kidnapers. and a host of other felons. Afghanistan is merely one state on a long list of such topographic points. Yemen. Somalia. Rwanda. parts of the Philippines. Burma. the Balkans. and important countries of Latin America ( including an country of Colombia larger than the province of Texas ) are all strategic nothingnesss. Developed states can non protect themselves from terrorist act and other organized condemnable onslaughts unless they set up legitimate observant gov- ernments in these strategic nothingnesss. That will necessitate the really frustrating and expensive procedure of state edifice. The recent dramatic addition in for- eign assistance promised by the President is far less than what will be required in any intelligent effort to protect Americans from the anarchic packs that constantly thrive in countries that lack legitimate authorities.

Science in the Budget

What is go oning with scientific discipline this twelvemonth? If you merely skimmed the President’s budget you might believe scientific discipline was go oning to make comparatively good. You would see a batch of flowery remarks about the importance of research and development ( R & A ; D ) to our economic system and security. You might besides believe the Numberss themselves seem satisfactory. The budget proposes to put $ 111. 8 billion for R & A ; D. which is an addition of $ 8. 6 billion ( eight per centum ) above last twelvemonth. That more than doubles the sum needed to maintain up with rising prices.

But it takes really small scrutiny to recognize that these additions are extremely concentrated on a few countries of the whole scope of federal research activi- ties. Of the $ 3. 9-billion addition slated for civilian research. 100 per centum goes to a individual agency—the National Institutes of Health ( NIH ) . That is non a good thought from the point of view of biomedical research. To dual NIH’s budget by FY 2003 and so supply no promise of addition beyond that day of the month is to add 100s of research workers to the federal grantee axial rotations who would non hold competed successfully had NIH grown at a nor- mal gait. These will be three-year grants and will hold to be accommo- dated in the NIH budget in FY 2003 and FY 2004. with or without addi- tional additions. As a consequence. NIH will be able to fund really few new and renewal grants in those old ages without extra additions. This means that we are likely to fund lower precedence proposals in the approaching twelvemonth at the ex- pense of higher precedence proposals in subsequent old ages. As a consequence some of the most competitory and valued research workers stand to be forced out of the system.

It should besides be noted that the strong justification for spread outing biomedical research is the great possible generated by the Human Genome Project. This work requires a really wide array of scientific subjects in- cluding those that are far more math-intensive than the 1s soon in- volved in biomedical research. If biological science is in fact more complex than the other scientific subjects. we should project a broader cyberspace and affect a greater part of the scientific community. CHALLENGES FACING S & A ; T AFTER SEPTEMBE

I am all for the addition in NIH support. but it should non be to run into an arbitrary political end and so supply for no farther enlargement. And it should non come at the disbursal of all other research. But this budget cuts all the remainder of civilian research outside NIH below last year’s nominal disbursement degrees. If you add the proposed budgets of the National Science Foundation. the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. the De- partment of Energy. the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administra- tion. and the other research constituents of the federal authorities you have a amount that shows we are passing $ 30 billion less in the coming twelvemonth than we are passing now. Since research costs are lifting faster than other costs you have a net loss of research in those bureaus of good over three per centum. With the exclusion of NIH we are non even standing still—we are traveling rearward.

Despite outward visual aspects on the DOD side. things are truly non a batch brighter. The budget proposes traveling defence R & A ; D up from $ 49 to $ 54 billion for the approaching twelvemonth. That looks like an eight per centum addition. But once more. the Satan is in the inside informations. The Administration’s inability to do picks has resulted in conveying three new combatant plans into production at the same time: the E & A ; F ( pedagogue and facilitator ) series of the F-18 Hor- cyberspace. the F-22 Raptor. and the Joint Strike Fighter. Not merely will the pro- curement costs of these planes be prohibitory but the development costs are besides steep. About half of the full R & A ; D growing at the Pentagon is attributable to the growing in the development costs of the Joint Strike Fighter.

This concentration on increasing our air high quality is non the best pick we can do. The planetary war on terrorist act will put a broad scope of new demands on the U. S. military. Never before has the job of happening the enemy been greater. Never earlier have we faced such hard require- ments in footings of clip and distance. But if there is a individual country in which we are non being challenged it is in our air high quality. I can non believe of a individual scenario that would allow any terrorist organisation or province to pro- duce aircraft that are competitory with current U. S. and allied combatants. Yet we are passing much of our R & A ; D investing on developing and constructing a new combatant.

Most of the Pentagon R & A ; D addition that is non traveling to the Joint Strike Fighter is traveling to missile defence. As a consequence. general DOD research. both applied and basic. is basically level. When rising prices is factored in. we will be purchasing less research in the coming twelvemonth than we are executing today. But I think it would be a error to judge this budget based entirely on support proposals for one twelvemonth. The existent jobs are in the hereafter. Esti- couples from the Congressional Budget Office indicate that the President’s budget will ensue in overall support for nondefense discretional plans to worsen from $ 370 billion in the current twelvemonth to $ 360 billion in the com- ing twelvemonth and $ 357 billion within three old ages. Declines in inflation-adjusted disbursement will go on through the remainder of the decennary.

The job is that merely maintaining gait with rising prices is non equal in a dynamic and turning society. The U. S. Census Bureau estimates that our population will increase from 280 million to more than 304 million in the following 10 years—an addition of 24 million or the equivalent of annexing four- fifths of Canada. Nominal gross domestic merchandise is expected to turn from $ 10 billion to more than $ 17 billion. an addition equivalent to the combined economic systems of England. France. Germany. and Spain. This means immense new demands on substructure. instruction systems. wellness attention. and energy supplies.

If we live within the discretional sums permitted in the President’s budget it besides means a immense scuffle for resources in Washington—one that will be far more intense than the one we see now. Within these sums we will hold to suit all new demands for fatherland security and increased foreign aid. Even so. I predict that some advocators like the veterans and the main road anteroom will keep their ain or at least come near. That means that others will be squeezed awfully. If this analysis sounds reasonable and you care about the promotion of scientific discipline. so you need to set together a program to get by with these worlds. One scheme is to surpass the other anterooms in Washington for the scarce resources that are left on the tabular array. A 2nd scheme is to fall in with others who are confronting this squeezing and seek to change by reversal the budget and revenue enhancement policies that created the squeezing. A 3rd scheme is to look to the private sector for resources. The 2nd pick seems most sensible. I think people who care about scientific discipline owe it to the state to seek to change by reversal these policies. We face another 2nd challenge that is every spot every bit dashing as the war on terrorist act. It is basically a challenge of human ecology. Science will play a cardinal function in its solution.

The Challenge of Changing Demographics

As the babe boomers begin retiring at the terminal of this decennary we will hold fewer and fewer workers to pay the measures and more and more aged with medical and subsistence demands. A popular position in Washington is that we should salvage for that contingency. If we build up big excesss in the Social Security and Medicare Trust Fundss so we will hold the money when it is needed. That analysis seems to do sense on the surface. But societies are non like persons. Societies must equilibrate their books on a year-to- twelvemonth footing. Stated more merely. you can borrow from your neighbors every bit long as he is non besides trying to borrow from person. You can impart to your neighbour every bit long as he is non trying to besides be a loaner. Societies that plan to be big loaners for a period of clip and so big borrowers at some future point necessarily run up the value of their assets ( existent estate. stocks. bonds. etc. ) . The value of those assets collapses when the clip comes for the society to jointly pull on them. When big Numberss of persons save for their retirement and the authorities adds to that nest eggs and so begins to do backdowns at the same clip as the persons. you have a financial policy that is merely increasing the size of the bubble.

That is exactly what happened in Japan. One could reason that the immense addition in equities and existent estate values in the United States in recent old ages is an indicant of the same job. The inquiry is: How can we all hard currency in our retirement histories at the same clip? Who will purchase? Federal Reserve Board president Alan Greenspan suggested an reply to that job a little more than two old ages ago when he stated. “something extraordinary has happened to the U. S. economic system in recent old ages. ” That extraordinary thing was the growing in productiveness. The president attributed that to new engineerings such as supercomputers. cistron splicing. robotics. and the Internet. What is stupefying to most fervent free entrepreneurs is that a immense per centum of these progresss for which they so proudly accept recognition are mostly the consequence of public investings. Investings made by the National Science Foundation and the U. S. Air Force in the 1950s created the anchor of what has become the Internet.

The sustained spendings at NIH created the biotechnology industry. We as a society spent money on these things 30. 40. even 50 old ages ago. Merely in the past decennary and a half have they begun transforming our economic system and our society. But the growing generated by these scientific progresss does non go on indefinitely. New scientific discovery will be required if we are to prolong the growing rates we enjoyed in the 1990s into the following decennaries. At that clip. we will hold a worsening work force and a work force that is progressively made up of people from lower income families with less chance for educational attainment.

Decision

The scientific community should non try to merely acquire a larger piece of a shrinkage pie. even if it could rally the clout to get the better of other involvements to make so. Fancy new machines will make little to spur the economic system and sustain growing without the workers capable of utilizing them. Training these workers will be a immense undertaking since America’s school-age population is coming progressively from disadvantaged and immigrant families. The investings needed are non immense in footings of the overall size of the U. S. economic system. They will non encroach on the ability of the private sector to turn and boom. To the contrary. they will supply American concern with the technological and human resources that concern by itself can non bring forth. It is a bold way and one that we might be loath to venture down. But it is the lone class that will change by reversal the unfortunate tendency we are now confronting.