The grand NIH budgetary debate of 2006

Over at Scienceblogs, there's a few things being said about this editorial (sub req) pointing out that the success rate of R01 grant funding has decreased dramatically since 2001. Since this is coincident with the selection of the Bush Administration, Nick and PZ connect some dots. To which Orac and Kevin respond--they're the more "conservative" types [an oversimplification of their actual viewpoints] at Scienceblogs and defend Bush here.

Both sides are correct in this debate. Certainly Bush could have taken the high road and told his Republican friends in the House and Senate to do more than 0% increase. On the other hand, ideologues in the House really should bear the brunt of blame here.

Biomedical inflation is 3.5% net, but that probably only covers the general inflation of income year-over-year. Real biomed inflation is probably closer to 7% or so, which was the level of year-to-year increases enjoyed by NIH between the disastrous Reagan years--where there was an actual cut in spending, not just a flatline--and the much acclaimed DOUBLING, OMGOMGOMG that ended a few years ago. The problem is that flatline could eventualy eviscerate the doubling in a few years putting us back to where we were in the 1990s. And yes, the Iraq war is supplemental to the federal budget so those costs probably wouldn't have landed at the NIH, and the tax-cuts were oh-so-necessary to increase federal revenue as we are always told. Whatever, the point is that there's some hard-core ideologues in government these days whose primary goal is to drain federal revenues and expenditures, including the NIH.

Take a look at these charts showing the size of R01 requests increasing while success rates decreased. There's a few things to point out. As the commenter PhysioProf points out, salaries of postdocs and graduate students has risen "astronomically" over the years. So much is true, but we're talking about an increased salary from the days when scientists were receiving something barely above poverty level at a time when it was still possible to go from undergrad straight to graduate school, finish up in four years, and get an academic job after at most a single postdoc position lasting a year or two. Those days are gone. Today's scientists often take some time between undergrad and graduate school, spend 6 years navigating the complexities of a greatly expanded field of knowledge and then go through sequential steps of junior, then senior postdoc or instructor positions, research associates and assistant profs. Let's face it, no one would be doing this if they would have to survive on $20K a year when they're 35 yrs old. And then there's the matter of funding larger projects that have a greater scope. That's likely also part of the trend. But let's face it, that hurts smaller places more than larger places. Not that I want to call OHSU "small," but it's certainly smaller than where I've spent my time these last few years...here's an interview of the new President:

One of Peter Kohler's priorities was to become a top 20 research institution in terms of funding from the National Institutes of Health. The school isn't there yet, and NIH funding is not growing. Is this still a priority for you?

It is a long-term goal. We will continue to pursue excellence. But we have to balance that against the other needs of the state. It's the balance of those needs that will determine the speed with which we approach that goal.

What role will the NIH's stagnant funding play?

Our researchers have shown a remarkable ability to compete on a national level. If you look across the institution, we have a number of departments that made significant increases in funding. That's a direct result of the investments we've made in the Oregon Opportunity and the phenomenal dedication of our investigators. If you look at how much we've grown, it's significantly more than what we've recruited, so we've successfully leveraged the investment.

People there are very down. True, grants are often funded the second or third time around and the numbers shown in the Science editorial don't take that into account. But often those edits are relatively minor (take out this section here, re-phrase that section there), meaning that the money's going to be spent on exactly what was proposed in the original proposal, just a few years later. These are big things: $750,000 - 1.5 million a pop. Things that help the economy by providing jobs and demand for equipment. And those delays probably wind up doing more harm than good

The bottom line here, really, is that to help our economy maintain its competitiveness by having top-quality research, we need to throw the bastards out who are penny-wise and pound-foolish.

I'm off to write my own grant proposal now...