(This analysis is part of a
AAAS effort to enumerate congressionally designated, performer-specific R&D
projects not appearing in agency budget requests (earmarks) in FY 2008 appropriations
bills. The data in this analysis highlight AAAS interpretations of R&D earmarks
in House- and Senate-approved appropriations. The complete series of AAAS R&D
Funding Updates, including continually updated analyses of R&D by agency in
FY 2008 appropriations, is available on the AAAS
R&D Web Site (http://www.aaas.org/spp/rd) in the “FY
2008 R&D” or the “What’s New” sections.)
- Congress has resumed earmarking R&D projects in 2008
appropriations, after a one-year moratorium on most domestic earmarks in 2007.
Before a month-long August recess, Senate appropriators designated $624 million
for congressionally designated, performer-specific R&D projects in FY 2008
appropriations excluding the Department of Defense (DOD; see Table
A and Figure 1), while the House would earmark $529 million for the same programs
in its appropriations.
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The 110th Congress has instituted new disclosure requirements for earmarks
that have made previously hidden DOD earmarks more visible. Only the House has
acted on 2008 DOD appropriations so far; the House would earmark $2.3 billion
in R&D projects out of the $77.6 billion total DOD R&D portfolio.
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Roughly one-fifth of the dollars Congress has added so far to the budget request
for nondefense R&D would be in the form of earmarks, leaving four-fifths of
the congressional increases for non-earmarked R&D funding. The House would
add $2.5 billion to the request for nondefense R&D, of which $529 million
would be in the form of earmarks; the Senate would add $3.0 billion to the request
for nondefense R&D, of which $624 million would be earmarked.
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The House would add $1.7 billion to DOD’s request for “S&T” programs (research
plus early technology development), of which $1.5 billion would be for earmarks.
For all DOD R&D, earmarks of $2.3 billion would be greater than the net
$1.4 billion the House would add to DOD’s R&D request.
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Although earmarking in House and Senate appropriations would return in agencies
such as the Department of Energy (DOE), the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA),
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration (NASA) in 2008 after a one-year moratorium in 2007, the
National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
would remain earmark-free.
FY 2008 R&D Earmarks in House and Senate
Appropriations
Before departing Washington
for a month-long August recess, the House approved its versions of all 12 FY 2008
appropriations bills. The Senate Appropriations Committee has drafted its versions
of all the bills except the one for the Department of Defense (DOD). (For full
details of federal R&D so far in 2008 appropriations, please see the AAAS August R&D
Funding Update, available on the AAAS
R&D Web site). The House versions of the bills contain $2.8 billion in
R&D earmarks, significantly more than in previous years, primarily because
of improved disclosure of DOD earmarks. The Senate versions of the bills, because
they exclude DOD for the moment, contain $624 million in R&D earmarks for
mostly different projects (see Table A and Figure
1). Excluding DOD, these earmark totals are comparable or less than earmark totals
from previous years except for 2007, when Congress had a moratorium on most non-DOD
earmarks.
Within
federal appropriations for R&D are R&D earmarks of unrequested, congressionally
designated performer-specific R&D projects contained in legislative language
or committee report language attached to appropriations bills. These projects
have been added to agencies’ requested budgets as part of the annual give-and-take
between Congress and the Executive Branch over the size and shape of agencies’
budgets. The current 110th Congress has made reforming the earmarking
process a priority, and has promised to reduce the number and amount of earmarks
from previous years and has also promised to make the earmarking process more
transparent.
- R&D earmarks total $624 million in Senate
FY 2008 appropriations bills so far, and $529 million in House appropriations
for the same agencies (excluding DOD). In addition, the House would earmark $2.3
billion in R&D projects within the DOD budget (see Table
A and Figure 1). The R&D earmarks make up less than 1 percent
of Senate R&D appropriations, and less than 1 percent of the House’s non-DOD
R&D appropriations. R&D earmarks make up 3 percent of the House DOD R&D
appropriation.
- Among domestic programs,
the House’s earmarks are found almost entirely in the Department of Energy (DOE;
$190 million) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA; $250 million; see
Figure 1). The Senate would earmark projects in those agencies, but would also
allocate significant dollars for earmarked projects in the National Aeronautics
and Space Administration (NASA; $70 million), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA; $53 million), and the previously earmark-free Department
of Homeland Security (DHS; $66 million).
Figure 1. (click on image for PDF)
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Roughly one-fifth of the dollars that Congress would add to the Bush Administration’s
budget request for nondefense R&D would be in the form of earmarks, leaving
four-fifths of the congressional increases for non-earmarked R&D funding.
The House would add $2.5 billion to the request for nondefense R&D, of which
$529 million would be in the form of earmarks; the Senate would add $3.0 billion
to the request for nondefense R&D, of which $624 million would be earmarked.
The remainder of the net additions to the budget request would boost R&D programs
that appear in the budget request or competitively awarded research programs.
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On the defense side, however, 87 percent of the dollars that the House would add
to the budget request for DOD’s “S&T” programs go to earmarks. The House would
add $1.7 billion to the Pentagon request for “S&T” (“6.1” plus “6.3” programs
and medical research, comprising basic and applied research and early technology
development), of which $1.5 billion would go to earmarked R&D projects. In
DOD’s weapons development programs (“6.4” and higher), the House would make program
cuts to several development projects while also adding $783 million in earmarks,
for a net cut to the request. Combining the two, House DOD R&D earmarks of
$2.3 billion would be more than the $1.4 billion the House would add to the Pentagon
request.
Figure 2. (click on image for PDF)
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In both the House and the Senate, the top 10 state recipients of R&D earmarks
would receive more than half of the total amount (see Figure 2), but the top 10
state beneficiaries of House earmarks would be completely different from the top
10 Senate beneficiaries. The top 10 House states tend to be the largest, most
populous states while the top 10 Senate states are mostly smaller states with
Senators in key committee chairmanships. The improved disclosure of earmarks instituted
by the current Congress enables earmarks to be more easily categorized by performer
and state. The AAAS R&D web site now has a searchable, sortable spreadsheet
cataloging all 2008 R&D earmarks in House and Senate appropriations so far
by amount, state, performer or project, and agency. (Click
here to download an Excel spreadsheet of House and Senate 2008 R&D earmarks
so far.)
- Some agencies remain earmark-free. The
National Science Foundation (NSF) and
the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
remain earmark-free in FY 2008 appropriations so far. Traditionally, NIH and NSF’s
research accounts have been free of earmarks, although in some years NSF construction
projects are earmarked. But although DHS remained earmark-free for the first three
years of its existence, one small earmark appeared in FY 2007 appropriations and
in FY 2008 the Senate would earmark several projects for a total of $66 million,
6 percent of total DHS R&D.
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Only in USDA do earmarks make up more than 1 in 10 total R&D dollars so
far, unlike in previous years when earmarks in selected USDA, NASA, and DOE
programs sometimes made up 1 out of every 5 R&D dollars (see Table A). R&D
earmarks total 18 percent of all extramural research in the Cooperative State
Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) in the House appropriation
and 12 percent in the Senate, making these a significant drain on resources that
might have gone to competitively awarded research grants or formula-based research
funding. The House would also earmark 12 percent of R&D funding in the Agricultural
Research Service (ARS), USDA’s intramural research arm. Without these earmarks,
USDA R&D funding would fall compared to (earmark-free) 2007 funding in both
the House and Senate 2008 plans. For all the other major
domestic R&D funding agencies, however, the House and Senate appropriations
would provide more R&D funding in 2008 compared to 2007 even if earmarks are
excluded.
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The DOD R&D portfolio of $77.6
billion in the House 2008 appropriation contains $2.3 billion in R&D earmarks,
dramatically higher than in previous years’ AAAS analyses because improved congressional
disclosure of earmarks has made many previously hidden earmarks more visible.
By several independent accounts, however, total House DOD earmarks would decline
in 2008 from earlier years. Of the $2.3 billion total, $1.5 billion of the earmarks
would go to the “S&T” accounts. The House would add $1.7 billion to the Pentagon
request for “S&T” programs, of which 86 percent or $1.5 billion would be in
the form of earmarks and the remainder for core program increases or adds
for competitively awarded research. In basic research (“6.1”), 94 percent of the
$127 million the House would add to the budget request would go to earmarks, to
make up 8 percent of the total DOD basic research portfolio. In applied research
(“6.2” plus medical research), the $701 million in House earmarks would represent
68 percent of all House additions to the Pentagon request, to make up 13 percent
of all DOD applied research. In the “6.3” category, the $692 million in House
earmarks would be more than the net House additions to the request because of
offsetting cuts in several “6.3” programs; earmarks would
make up 12 percent of the total “6.3” portfolio. The impact of earmarking would
be less on the weapons development (“6.4” and higher) programs: the $783 million
in weapons development earmarks would make up only 1.2 percent of the total portfolio.
As in previous years, the Army ($1.1 billion) budget would contain most of the
House earmarks, followed by the Navy, the Defense Agencies, and the Air Force.
9 percent of the Army’s R&D budget would be taken up by earmarks in the House
plan. The Senate plans to draft its 2008 DOD appropriations in September.
Definitions: What is an R&D Earmark?
For
the purposes of this analysis, R&D earmarks are defined as “congressionally
designated performer-specific R&D projects not included in agency budget requests.”
The earmarks appear in either legislative language contained in appropriations
bills, in which case they have the force of law, or appear in committee report
language accompanying appropriations bills, in which case they are technically
advisory. For all practical purposes, however, agencies usually follow the instructions
from Congress contained in committee report language, including earmarks. When
Congress designates a specific performer or performers for a particular R&D
project, these are counted as earmarks; because AAAS definitions of R&D include
investments in R&D facilities construction, the earmarks in this analysis
also include funds provided to specific institutions for investments in R&D
major capital equipment, and also construction funds for specific R&D facilities.
Starting with this year’s appropriations bills, Congress has instituted new disclosure
requirements for earmarks so that all performer-specific congressional additions
to appropriations bills are disclosed by amount and by congressional sponsor(s).
AAAS
definitions of R&D earmarks have tended to undercount earmarks in the past,
because they include explicitly performer-specific projects only. In the FY 2008
appropriations season, however, the number of R&D earmarks will expand dramatically,
especially in DOD, as the new congressional disclosure requirements make visible
earmarks that were previously hidden in non-performer specific language. Congress
often designates funding for a specific research project without identifying a
location explicitly, but on the implicit understanding that only one organization
is capable of performing it or has already been selected to do earlier work in
that area. Such topical earmarks are common in DOD’s R&D portfolio, where
earmarks for weapons projects or technology areas are understood to steer the
funds to a specific performer with demonstrated expertise or past experience.
While such earmarks were difficult to identify in earlier years, in 2008 appropriations
the tagging of each project with a congressional sponsor makes the location of
the intended performer visible.
Congress
often designates funding for specific projects or research topics; in some cases
such as in DOD’s peer-reviewed medical research programs the topics may be congressionally
designated but the performers are selected competitively, so they are not counted
as earmarks.
These
figures include earmarks to all categories of R&D performers. While discussion
of the earmarks issue tends to center on earmarks to academic institutions, this
analysis also includes R&D earmarks to other categories of performers, most
prominently federal laboratories. While academic institutions receive the bulk
of the earmarks for nondefense R&D in Table A
(defense R&D earmarks tend to favor industrial performers), federal laboratories,
sometimes located on university campuses, also receive earmarks as well as some
nonprofits and industrial firms.
The
earmarks counted in this analysis are a subset of R&D in the federal budget
as tracked by AAAS. Thus, the earmarks in this analysis do not include non-R&D
projects that may go to R&D performers, for example educational or extension
projects awarded to universities and colleges. Some of these earmarks may come
from the same budget accounts that fund R&D earmarks. They also do not include
construction funds for non-R&D facilities, except when they are provided in
R&D accounts.
Purpose of the AAAS Analysis
The
analysis is intended to provide timely and unbiased information for further analysis
and debate on the allocation of R&D resources in the federal budget process,
and the R&D Budget and Policy Program undertakes this analysis to provide
timely and relevant information for policymakers and members of the science and
engineering community who are concerned about methods of allocating R&D resources.
It attempts to provide additional information to supplement existing AAAS coverage
of R&D in the appropriations process. The
analysis is not a comprehensive inventory of earmarks. Also, because earmarks
are in the eye of the beholder and are ill-defined (unlike the standardized, longstanding
definitions for R&D used by AAAS and federal agencies) this analysis relies
on AAAS interpretations and judgment calls on a project-by-project basis of what
is or is not an R&D earmark. In doing this analysis, AAAS does not take a
position on the relative merits of agency requests vs. congressional earmarks,
or of competitively awarded funds vs. earmarked funds.
Conclusions
When
Congress returns to session in September, the October 1 start of FY 2008 will
be less than four weeks away. Appropriators have already given up hope of completing
FY 2008 appropriations on time, so most federal R&D funding agencies will
have to wait until well into the fall to receive their final budgets. There has
been much debate and attention on the practice of congressional earmarking in
this 110th Congress, primarily as a result of the new Democratic majority
promising to rein in the freewheeling earmarking practices of past Congresses.
To start the year, the Democratic majority finalized FY 2007 appropriations with
a one-year moratorium on most domestic R&D earmarks, and then tried to set
up a more transparent process for allocating and disclosing earmarks in the 2008
appropriations process. After some fits and starts, the new earmark disclosure
process appears to be well in place as the 2008 appropriations bills move forward.
So far Congress, armed with more money than the President’s request for domestic
appropriations, has managed to add funds primarily for non-earmarked projects
but also for earmarks on the nondefense side, unlike in past years when restrictive
budget totals forced appropriators to cut into non-earmarked funds in order to
make room for earmarks. But it is too soon to tell how R&D funding will fare
in final 2008 appropriations, and there are few clear signals as to how the House
and Senate will combine their mostly separate lists of earmarks in the final versions
of 2008 agency appropriations.
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August 20, 2007
AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
(202) 326-6607; -6600
AAAS
R&D web site: www.aaas.org/spp/rd
