Papers Commissioned for a Workshop on the Federal Role in Research and Development (1985) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
A Historical Overview of the Evolution of Federal Investment in Research and Development Since World War II
A Historical Overview of the Evolution of Federal Investment in Research and Development Since World War II
Pages 1-36
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 1... ...
The ''ou~cput'9 of research is so lacking in dimensional icy that there are no direct measures of magnitude or number of units. Measurement and Station problems appear somewhat less complicated on ache input side, where it is at least possible to identify and measure, in dollar terms, specific costs of performing research.
|
From page 2... ...
Rather, decisions are made on the basis of some quali~cati~re judgments of ache signs ficance of ~ particular proj ect proposal, its relevance to ache sponsoring agency, and ache scientific or technical competence of the competitors. Obvious ly, this is far from traditional government procurement practices involving public advertisement asked bidding for products whose charac~cPriscics could be specified in de~cail9 and award of contracts deco the bidder.
|
From page 3... ...
Very little research of any kind was undertaken by ache new land-grant colleges for ache first 25 years after the passage of the Morrill Act. then ache Hatch Act was passed into law in 1887, it provided federal funds for agricultural experiment stations, but not, significantly, for engineering experimen~c s tations .
|
From page 4... ...
. ~ Federal expenditures for R&D throughout the 1930 's consul cured between 12 and 20 percent of estimated total R&~ expenditures.
|
From page 5... ...
In ache postwar period, by contrast, although the proportion has varied substantially over time, the vast maj ority of federal R&D funds, about 75 percent in 1984, has been for acti~ri~cies performed by a variety of organizations in the private sector. Essentially, the arrangements have enabled the federal government deco determine the priorities and broad goals of the ac~ci~rities it finances.
|
From page 6... ...
°s twar period is its sheer magnitude. In absolute terms, there was ~ sharp decline in the immediate postwar years from the wartime higns of 1~94 and 194S, a decline attributable mainly to a radical reduction in expenditures on the Manhattan Pro; epic and, to a lesser degree, to the rapid phasing out of OSRD and a cu~cbacic in Deparmen~c of Defense expenditures ~ see Appendix)
|
From page 7... ...
TABLE ~ National Expenditures for Performance of R&D as Percent of Gross National Product by Source, 1953-1984 Year Total Federal Nonfederal 1953 1e 40 a75 o65 1954 1~54 .85 66 1955 le54 .88 ~ OL956 1~913 le15 .83 1957 2e20 lo313 .~32 1958 2~38 le51 .87 1959 2~53 le65 e88 1960 2~67 1~73 .94 1961 2 ~ 73 ~ o 76 .97 1962 2 oT2 1 e75 a97 1963 2~86 1~88 .98 1964 2~96 1~97 o99 i965 2~90 1~88 1~02 1966 2~89 1085 le04 i967 2 0 89 ~ 0 80 1 009 i968 2~82 lotl loll 1969 2.
|
From page 8... ...
TAB T ~ 2 Federal, Primate, and Total R&~, l9S3-1984, Constant 1972 dollars (millions ~ Year Total Federal Private ~ Federal 1953 $8702 $4675 $4027 5307 1954 9456 52Li7 4209 55°7 1955 101~2~L 5473 464,8 5401 1956 i3296 77~4 55632 Sect 95.T 15034 935~7 5637 6205 958 - ~ 5214 iC3262 5952 63~3 959 ~8303 1~1917 63136 6501 i960 3~969 3 1~2725 6968 6406 196i 20664 ~ 3351 73:L3 64~6 1962 21820 140413 7772 6Lo4 1963 23829 1565: 8178 6507 19 64 259 30 17241 a6a9 66 e 5 1965 26~396 17443 9453 64eg i966 2~3442 lasso 10262 6309 1~967 29241 ldl76 ~ 1~065 62~2 :~6a 29333 18108 11725 60.7 1969 ~586 1?
|
From page 9... ...
Nevertheless, it is important to insist that the size and composite an of the federal budget have been driven by a sequence of Excel events and changing domestic concerns and social priorities, among which the largest and most persistent have been national defense and strategic considera~cions. A detailed history of the postwar federal R&D budget would have to be in~cert~ined with a series 0 f international events and changing condi Lions; among them , a prolonged Cold War posture; a Soviet nuclear explosion in L949 and thermonuclear explosion in 1951; the outbreak of the Korean jar in June 19SO; the emergence of missile technology in the mid-i9SO's, which transformed the nature of military hardware; Sputnik and the subsequent commitment deco ~ space program; the budgetary impact 0 f Mae 'Vietnam War; the changing social priorities associated twitch Great Society programs; the growth of environmental, safety, and health concerns ; a ''War on Cancer"; a huge growth in energy research by eve Energy Research and Development Administration and, later, the Department of Energy; and, more recently, a widening concern over the apparent decline in IJ.
|
From page 10... ...
TABLE 3 Trends in Federal and Nonfederal R&D Outlays, 19 5 3 and 1960 - 1984 (percents ~ ~ed eral ,.
|
From page 11... ...
. TABLE 4 Federal Funds for R&I)
|
From page 12... ...
spending held by the federal oudget, tine result is also to 1 apart a stronger development bias co the composition of cotal R&D spending. If the t982 federal budget is broken down ~ nto defense and nonde fens e components, the share of basic, applied, and development expenditures within each total appears as follows: 19 8 3 Federal R&D Expendi Cures L3 ~ 9e share ~ Defense Nondefense Basic 3.2 33.7 Applied lilt.
|
From page 14... ...
In 1981, private funding accounted for 62 percen~c of industry R&D, a sizable increase over t971' when the ratio was only 49 percent. In the case of communication equipment and electronic components, which account for most of electrical equipment R&O' ache share of private funding was even greater.
|
From page 15... ...
TABLE 6 Company End Federal Funding of Indeusteria1 R&I) for Sales reed Industries, 1971 and 1981 Ton Fan Comouty ~ .
|
From page 16... ...
Empirical evidence on such questions would be helpful in assessing the tmpac~c of military R&D. FEDERAL SUPPORT OF SCI ONCE The po-arwar Rho structure has been one in which federal expenditures have financed somewhere between one half and two thirds of tomcat R&D, while ~e great bulk of R&D activity, including the federally financed share, has been performed by priorate industry.
|
From page 17... ...
rnac is, however, an extremeiv critical IS percent. ApproximateL;~- 3 percent consist of federally funded research and development centers (rFRDC's)
|
From page 18... ...
I ABLE- ~ Basic Research Performance by Sector, 195 3, 1960, and tam- 1384 kdollars in millions ~ @ 7 Current tollare .
|
From page 19... ...
. I.ABL~- ~ Sources o f Funds for Bas ic Research by Sector, 1953, 1960, and ~ 965-1984 (dollars in millions)
|
From page 20... ...
~ i3LE ) Federal Obligations for Basic Research, by Selected Agency, Fiscal Years 1975-1985 (dollars in millions)
|
From page 21... ...
S . university community in the postwar period has been financed primarily by a huge increase in federal expend)
|
From page 22... ...
The combination of research and teaching has been carried much further in ache United States than elsewhere. In Europe and Japan, for example, a larger fraction of research is carried out in specialized research institutes, not connected directly with higher education, and in go~rernment-operated laboratories.
|
From page 23... ...
TABLE 10 Federal Ou~clays for R&D Plant, 1960-1983 (dollars in millions) Yeat Current dollars S "3.8 539.1 555~ 67:~6 948.1 t,O77.4 1,047.8 792.7 723 8 657.0 J8.9 612~7 564.4 638.4 ?
|
From page 24... ...
That diversity encouraged experimentation with different modes of organization, exploi~ced a wide range of social pulses, and stimulated a number of different responses deco specific social concerns. It offered the opportunity for exploiting the very different potential strengths of social and ind~'rid~1 diversity rather than imposing a single model, as in the French form of centralized government, or in the British system, where higher education reflected and suffered from ache narrowing and debilitating effects of a rigid class system.
|
From page 25... ...
Intuiti~rely, the federal role would seem to have been the strongest in basic research' where successful completion of research should provide a stimulus to further applied research and product development, but where priorate research expenditures are ~ ikely to be limited because of the strong uncertainties, long-defer~ed bene'_ts, and d~fficui~ies of ensuring use of the results inherent in basic research O Certainly, the growth ire federal e~cgendi tures raises the potential prof~cability of much research conducted by priorate industry and, thus, may hare induced a large amount of priorate expenditures. Lee relevant counterquestion is, of course, what would have been the size and ache composition of private R6`D spending had the federal.
|
From page 26... ...
A more tenuous and conj ectura1 interaction is how employment in federally supported programs way have affected che subsequen~c effectiveness of professional personnel who lacer shifted to civilian employers ~ for example, with the decline of NASA expendi~cures slicer the completion of the Apollo program)
|
From page 27... ...
3 million. The 38 engineering experiInen~c s cations at the land- grant institutions in 1938 had a topical budget of j ust over 61 million from state and local sources (see National Resources Committee.
|
From page 28... ...
issues, see Clarence OarhofO Government Cones acting and Technological Change. Washington, OC: The Brookings Institution, L968.
|
From page 29... ...
20. The uni~rersi~cies, ranked by size of OSRD contracts, were the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the California Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Columbia Uni~rers~;y, ache University of California at Berkeley, Johns Hopkins University, ache University of Chicago, George Washington University, Princeton University, and ache University of Pennsylvania.
|
From page 30... ...
Me National Science Foundation updates ache series continually, and, as a result, the later tables are not strictly comparable with the earlier ones. In the table for ache years L940 through 1973, ache numbers before L9 5 3 are not directly comparable with those after .
|
From page 31... ...
~ ABLE A- 1 Federal Expenditures for Research, Development, and R&D Plant, by Agency, Fiscal Years 1940-1973 (dollars in millions)
|
From page 32... ...
I.\BLE A- 1 (continued)
|
From page 34... ...
TAB=: A- 2 ~ contin -- ed)
|
From page 35... ...
TABLE A-3 Federal Outlays for Research, Development, and R&D Plant, by Agency, Fiscal Years 197S-1985 (dollars in millions)
|
From page 36... ...
TABLE A- 3 ~ continued)
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.