The administration's cuts to federal science funding could have substantial costs in long term economic development according to studies cited in a NYTimes report (04/30/2025) by NYT chief economics reporter Ben Casselman.
Researchers like this may disappear as a result of Trump Administration
Science budget cuts
An American University study found that a 25% cut in science funding would result in a long term reduction of 3.8% in US GDP and a 4.4% reduction in government revenues. That is comparable to the effects of the Great Recession which ended in 2009. The reduction would occur over years rather than months, but it would be more lasting. The AU study is consistent with other studies. A recent study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas found that government sponsored research accounted for 20% of the productivity growth since WWII. An author of the Federal Reserve study, Texas A&M economist Andrew Fieldhouse, said, “If you look at a long period of time, a lot of our increase in living
standards seems to be coming from public investment in scientific
research, The rates of return are just really high.”
There is a tradition of private and philanthropic research support for hospitals, medical research institutes, commercial product development, and sometimes particular fundamental research resources like telescopes. But government supports sustained long term research that provides fundamental understanding of the world around us and new knowledge that belongs to the public rather than private entities. The studies suggest that this research is simply irreplaceable.
The report is obviously positive on science in general and by implication chemistry in particular. One bit of context would be the extent to which large reductions in the science budgets would actually reduce the federal overall budget and particularly the federal deficit.
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