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The outgoing 106th Congress and President Clinton agreed
to provide record increases for R&D programs throughout the federal government,
and provided substantial increases to nearly all categories of R&D spending
and most R&D funding agencies.
- In FY 2001, total federal support for R&D exceeds $90 billion for
the first time, thanks to a record dollar increase of $7.6 billion over
FY 2000. Because of increases across the entire breadth of R&D programs
in the federal portfolio, federal R&D totals $90.9 billion in FY 2001,
an increase of 9.1 percent (see Table 1).
- The FY 2001 R&D total far exceeds the $85.4 billion President's request,
primarily because Congress allocated far more for R&D in the Department
of Defense (DOD) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the two
largest R&D funding agencies, than the Administration requested (see
Table 1).
· Nearly every
major R&D funding agency receives a substantial increase over FY 2000,
and most receive more than the request. Of the major R&D funding agencies,
only the National Science Foundation (NSF) receives less for R&D than
requested, but NSF still receives 13.2 percent more for R&D than in
FY 2000.
· Nondefense R&D
increases by more than 11 percent to reach $45.3 billion, a boost of
$4.6 billion. In addition to a 14.6 percent or $2.5 billion increase
in NIH R&D, there are substantial increases for other nondefense agencies.
R&D in the Department of Energy (DOE) increases by 12.3 percent to reach
$8.0 billion, including a 13.8 percent boost to programs in the Office
of Science; NSF R&D increases by 13.2 percent to $3.2 billion, with
substantial increases for all the research directorates; and Science,
Aeronautics and Technology R&D in the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) increases by nearly 11 percent.
- Defense R&D increases by a smaller but still substantial 7.0 percent
to $45.5 billion, bringing defense and nondefense R&D near parity for
the first time in 20 years. DOD basic research ("6.1") jumps by nearly
13 percent, while applied research ("6.2") increases by nearly 8 percent.
DOE's defense R&D continues the gains of recent years with a 12.0 percent
increase in FY 2001.
- Basic research receives large increases in FY 2001 appropriations.
Federal support for basic research is expected to total $21.2 billion
in FY 2001, up $2.2 billion or 11.8 percent (see Table
2). There are across-the-board increases for agencies' basic research-oriented
programs, including increases greater than 10 percent for basic research
in NIH, NSF, and DOD.
- The Clinton Administration's multi-agency initiatives do well in FY
2001, though funding levels fall short of the requested increases. The
new nanotechnology initiative grows from $247 million in FY 2000 to
an estimated $418 million in FY 2001, a 55 percent increase. The Information
Technology R&D initiative sees its funding climb nearly 24 percent to
$2.1 billion in FY 2001, including a dramatic jump from $90 million
to $215 million for NSF's IT Research component.
- Health-related R&D and defense R&D both rise by nearly $3 billion
in FY 2001 (see Table 3). Most other
functional categories of R&D also see large increases, including a 13.5
percent increase to $6.2 billion for general science R&D because of
large increases for NSF and DOE's Science programs.
- Nondefense R&D reaches an all-time high in FY 2001, the fifth year
in a row that it has increased in inflation-adjusted terms. Much of
the recent increase, however, has been due to steady growth in the NIH
budget. NIH R&D has become nearly as large as all other nondefense agencies'
R&D combined. The large FY 2001 increases for non-NIH nondefense agencies
follow several years of stagnant or declining budgets.
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