Abstract
We examine effects of government spending on postdoctoral researchers’ (postdocs) productivity in biomedical sciences, the largest population of postdocs in the US. We analyze changes in the productivity of postdocs before and after the US government’s 1997 decision to increase NIH funding. In the first round of analysis, we find that more government spending has resulted in longer postdoc careers. We see no significant changes in researchers’ productivity in terms of publication and conference presentations. However, when the population is segmented by citizenship, we find that the effects are heterogeneous; US citizens stay longer in postdoc positions with no change in publications and, in contrast, international permanent residents (green card holders) produce more conference papers and publications without significant changes in postdoc duration. Possible explanations and policy implications of the analysis are discussed.
Highlights
In 2013, the US government spent more than 130 billion dollars to fund research activities in basic and applied areas in fields as diverse as biomedical sciences, energy, space, environment, and defense [1]
While we intuitively expect that more government spending in the form of providing research grants should increase the population of researchers, there is a range of mixed arguments about possible effects on each individual researcher
We focused on analyzing changes in productivity of postdocs before and after the US government’s decision to increase National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding in 1997
Summary
In 2013, the US government spent more than 130 billion dollars to fund research activities in basic and applied areas in fields as diverse as biomedical sciences, energy, space, environment, and defense [1]. The funding was distributed to research institutions and individuals through several government organizations, such as the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) [2]. Government research funds are intended to foster research discoveries through training and recruiting researchers as well as developing and equipping related facilities and improving research productivity. Success in these policies can be evaluated by the extent to which funding allocations result in actual outcomes in the forms of science advancement, major breakthroughs, and workforce development, which all benefit the public.
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