WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.) cautioned against declining investments in fundamental science and research at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing Tuesday, warning that weaker federal investment amounts to “unilaterally disarming” in the global race for innovation. As a share of GDP, federal R&D investments have declined by more than 50 percent since 1980, leading to a cumulative $1.5 trillion R&D investment deficit in the United States. These cuts have stifled U.S. innovation just as our key competitors in China, Singapore, and South Korea are aggressively increasing their own R&D investments.

“If we invest in American innovation, plain and simple, then we are investing in our future,” Senator Coons said. “I think all of us have agreed that this is one of the most important, most dynamic areas of federal investment, and for us to be restricting and reducing the amount of investment in fundamental science and research means we are steadily creating an innovation deficit, and we are unilaterally disarming in the race for global leadership in new inventions.”

Economists estimate that technological innovation is responsible for more than half of all U.S. economic growth since WWII. Much of that innovation is a result of federally funded scientific research, which has played a key role in the development of technology ranging from the transistor to the Internet.

The federal government currently funds 60 percent of all U.S. basic research, and 31 percent of all U.S. research and development. These federal R&D investments create “knowledge spillovers” into the economy that multiply the returns on the initial R&D cost.

Reduced R&D investments also imperil the gains made by our nation’s steadily recovering manufacturing sector.

“If we’re not inventing things here, then we aren’t making things here,” Senator Coons continued. “And the things that we are inventing here are increasingly not being made here. There is a critical connection between advanced manufacturing and basic science being done by federally funded labs.” 

Tuesday’s hearing examined the broad range of federal investments in R&D that support scientific innovation and drive the U.S. economy. The hearing featured testimony from Dr. John Holdren, Director of the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, NIH Director Frances Collins, NSF Director France Córdova, and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Director Arati Prabhakar.