Partisan Politics and the Science-Industrial Complex

Measuring the Democratic and Republican Party platforms on science and technology policy

Ronald Bailey | September 16, 2008

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Research Funding:

Both the Republicans and the Democrats strongly favor making the Research and Development Tax Credit permanent. The idea is that this tax break will spur technological innovation. The Republican platform says, "We support federal investment in basic and applied biomedical research." Why? Because such funding is supposed to boost America's global competitiveness and lead to innovative cures.

The Democrats declare, "Over the past eight years, the current Administration has not only failed to promote biomedical and stem cell research, it has actively stood in the way of that research." Actually, the Bush administration's support for the National Institutes of Health has held steady at around $30 billion per year. However, the Democrats pledge, "We will increase funding to the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, and the National Cancer Institutes." By how much? "We will double federal funding for basic research," the progressives promise.

Both Democrats and Republicans clearly recognize the centrality of science and technology in driving economic growth, and also believe that the government has some responsibility for managing the cultural disorientation that technological progress can induce. But was Vannevar Bush right? Do we really need a national research establishment funded and, to some extent, directed by the federal government to engender economic growth? Perhaps not. A 2003 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development report, The Sources of Economic Growth, found "a marked positive effect of business-sector R&D, while the analysis could find no clear-cut relationship between public R&D activities and growth, at least in the short term." While the Republicans express a bit more skepticism than the Democrats, the platforms show that both parties still buy the vision of a government-funded science-industrial complex.

Ronald Bailey is reason's science correspondent. His book Liberation Biology: The Scientific and Moral Case for the Biotech Revolution is now available from Prometheus Books.

Comments

|9.16.08 @ 3:08PM|#

Caption Contest!

"Hey America! You're going to feel a little poke! THIS IS THE COLBERT REPORT!"

|9.16.08 @ 3:11PM|#

So is Herbert West a Democrat or Republican?

Trick question, he joined the Reform Party!

Alan|9.16.08 @ 3:46PM|#

FYI, Both McCain and Obama have answered Scientists and Engineers for America's scince policy questions. The answers are available on line here:

http://sefora.org/2008/09/15/mccain-answered-the-14-questions-on-science/

|9.16.08 @ 3:51PM|#

Awesome Reaminator pic

|9.16.08 @ 4:18PM|#

Jeffrey Combs RULZ!

DannyK|9.16.08 @ 4:38PM|#

I always thought "sound science" is one of those Orwellian terms of art, like "wise use", that sound reassuring but in practice mean "whatever the science says, unless the science says something the constituents don't like."

Acoustics|9.16.08 @ 6:01PM|#

"sound science"

|9.17.08 @ 10:21AM|#

"Actually, the Bush administration's support for the National Institutes of Health has held steady at around $30 billion per year."

Which is effectively a cut when the costs of doing biomedical research have increased over the same interval (which they have).

I realize most libertarians are more than OK with this, but it is inaccurate to say that the Bush administration's support for the NIH has been "constant" in any meaningful sense.

Andy|9.17.08 @ 4:51PM|#

So it's official: Republicans think it's abnormal to have sex before marriage. Does that mean questions of whether they personally followed this are now acceptable?

On the plus side, we can send all the new kids to live on the moon or Mars.