Impact of proposed budget cuts on Science and Technology

Not a long time ago, our President made a speech in which he extolled the virtues of innovation and how this will drag the United States out of the pit in which it was put by corporate greed. Now, a short time later, we are facing the prospect of budget cuts that would gut the existing research programs and stem future ones.

This is what Schumer and Bishop write on this topic:

LINK

House GOP Budget Cuts Could Force Brookhaven National Lab to Lay off 930 Scientists, Engineers, Technicians and Support Staff – One Third of the Lab’s Employees

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Closing of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC): The federal government has invested approximately $3.5 billion in capital and operating finds in RHIC. If these cuts were enacted, RHIC would have to curtail operations immediately, which would lead to layoffs of 300 science and support personnel. This would mean that BEST Medical, a commercial partner that relies on the Lab’s cutting edge research facility to develop the next generation of accelerators for treatment of tumors, would have to cease work. The US Healthcare system as a whole also relies on RHIC for the ancillary, low-cost production of radioisotopes, the cost of which would skyrocket if the healthcare system had to pay full recovery costs for accelerator operations. Dozens of prominent U.S. Universities including Stony Brook, MIT, Columbia and Yale also rely on RHIC for their research.

Cuts to Research into Alternative Fuels, Sustainable Energy: Cuts would end development of nonfood plants as the only sustainable, renewable source of carbon for high value chemicals and materials including fuels, thereby extending US dependence on petroleum. The loss of basic and applied research for chemical conversions and the resulting loss in competitive position would not only endanger existing American jobs in the chemical industry, but also damage US ability to take advantage of the economic opportunity emerging in sustainable chemical conversions for the energy sector via synthesis of fuels from abundant materials.

Cuts to research in life science and fundamental science: Cuts could eliminate between 150-200 employees, potentially ending life sciences and environmental sciences research at the Lab.

Bad times, bad news, end of American edge in science.

Hey Mr Obama how about we cut our defense budget by withdrawing US military presence overseas instead of Science and innovations? I'm sure that will save us money

Originally posted by starwarsisreal
Hey Mr Obama how about we cut our defense budget by withdrawing US military presence overseas instead of Science and innovations? I'm sure that will save us money

edit on 16-2-2011 by starwarsisreal because: (no reason given)

These are all good ideas. But the danger of an abrupt and severe cut in science funding will affect even our defense capability. You need a vibrant and diverse body of scientists, engineers and technicians to support defense effort, and if you half this population, your capability will suffer. One of the scientists I worked with a long time ago now has a senior position at Raytheon. If her funds were cut some years ago, the company would never receive her talent.

Originally posted by buddhasystem
Not a long time ago, our President made a speech in which he extolled the virtues of innovation and how this will drag the United States out of the pit in which it was put by corporate greed....

Bad times, bad news, end of American edge in science.

He also made a campaign promise to close Guantanamo and he couldn't even pull that off, so I find it hard to trust what he says when he says one thing and does another. The USA has been exporting wealth to the middle east for energy and to China for manufacturing, so with the declining wealth I suppose some budget cuts are inevitable, but there have to be better areas to cut than science research.

Originally posted by starwarsisreal
Hey Mr Obama how about we cut our defense budget by withdrawing US military presence overseas instead of Science and innovations? I'm sure that will save us money

edit on 16-2-2011 by starwarsisreal because: (no reason given)

So now Obama is accountable for Republican congressmen? Did you notice the first four words of the quoted OP article "House GOP Budget Cuts". Get it? It's the House Republicans that are proposing these cuts.