So Trump’s Office of Management and Budget pick, Mick Mulvaney, apparently doesn’t believe the government should fund science. This is argument I hear with some regularity from certain quarters, and I have written multiple rebuttals over the past couple of years in my space at Pacific Standard. Here are six articles and five reasons why the government should fund science:
- It provides the basic understanding of disease mechanisms, without which drug companies can’t make effective drugs.
- Philanthropy is not enough to make up for government funding.
- Government-funded science has brought huge economic benefits by transforming how we eat, travel, communicate, and care for our health.
- Government-funded, curiosity-driven science has a history of huge payoffs.
- Government-funded science is how we build a well-trained scientific workforce.
The Finch and Pea 