NewScientist (29 July 2017) reports some numbers on how US government investment spurs economic activity:
Between 2007 and 2015, the US spent $14 billion on global health research, according to the Global Health Technologies Coalition (GHTC), a group of organisations that promote such efforts, including the Gates Foundation.
According to the GHTC analysis, for each of those dollars spent, 89 cents remained in the US, paying for US researchers and their work. This investment is calculated to have created 200,000 jobs and added $53 billion to US economic output.
“What really struck me was that every taxpayer’s dollar spent on basic research generates an additional $8.38 of industry investment over eight years,” says GHTC director Jamie Bay Nishi.
But president Donald Trump’s proposed 2018 budget, published in May, revealed plans to cut federal funding for programmes described as providing “little return to the American people”. The health budget was titled “Putting America’s health first”. The GHTC estimates that the cuts associated with these plans add up to around $5 billion.
You figure if the Gates Foundation, run by businessman Bill Gates, is involved, then the numbers should have a bit more credibility in the eyes of the private sector. But it appears that our fine GOP-led government has only the shallowest understanding of economics – and they won’t talk to experts, is my guess. On the other hand, Trump’s budget is hardly a done deal, especially given this report from John Harwood on CNBC:
Increasingly, federal officials are deciding to simply ignore President Donald Trump.
As stunning as that sounds, fresh evidence arrives every day of the government treating the man elected to lead it as someone talking mostly to himself.
On Tuesday alone, the commandant of the Coast Guard announced he will “not break faith” with transgender service members despite Trump’s statement that they could no longer serve. Fellow Republicans in the Senate moved ahead with other business despite the president’s insistence that they return to repealing Obamacare. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said, “we certainly don’t blame the Chinese” for North Korea’s nuclear program after Trump claimed, “China could easily solve this problem.” And Vice President Mike Pence said the president and Congress speak in a “unified voice” on a bipartisan Russia sanctions bill Trump has signed, but not publicly embraced.
It’s good to see Congress asserting some independence, but there’s little evidence of necessary expertise residing there, either.
