You seem to be unfamiliar with how indirect rates work.
First some basic math: if a project is budgeted at a direct cost of $500,000, the indirect rate of 60% applies to the $500,000, i.e. $300,000.
The total grant is thus $500K + $300K = $800K. The $300K indirect costs are thus 37.5% of the total. This is an upper limit, as many direct costs such as equipment do not get indirect rates applied to them.
Second, these rates are painstakingly negotiated with the NSF and NIH. Yearly audits to ensure compliance must be passed if funding is to continue.
Third, these indirect cost go towards to items such as electricity, heat, building maintenance, safety training and compliance, chemical disposal, and last by not least laboratory support services such as histology labs, proteomics core, compute infrastructure, and some full time staff scientific staff. Only a relatively small portion goes to administration.
Finally, scientists generally would welcome review and reform of indirect costs to ensure they get the maximize benefit from the indirect rates. However, DOGE is not interested in reform. They are interested in raze and burn destruction.
If DOGE gets its way, it will knock the Unites States off its perch as the world’s technological leader.
You can tell people the truth all day long. They don’t want to hear it. They’re convinced that academia is rotten to the core and none of your facts and figures will dissuade them.
For example I know at my institution every dollar, every piece of effort, is painstakingly tracked and attributed to funding sources. We have extensive internal checks to make sure we aren’t misusing funds. Audits happen at every major milestone. All of that effort is reported. It’s exhausting but the government requires it because we have to be good stewards of the funds we have been granted. No one believes it.
I’m not part of academia but was heavily involved in funding because of my position in student government while still in college.
While I won’t argue there isn’t waste (what endeavor doesn’t have waste?) it’s an incredibly tiny percentage (except in cases where there was actual fraud, which we also discovered and the Feds prosecuted and convicted people for).
The irony is that academia is so afraid of “waste” that I wouldn’t be surprised if colleges spend more money on the auditing and the compliances, etc than the actual waste they prevent.
I’ve had to deal with NIH audits up close. The amount of work devoted to compliance can make one question if the grant money is even worth it in the first place.
A big part of the reason indirect rates evolved is because the administrative burden to track direct costs is immense. How do you split up direct costs on an electric bill? Do you place a meter on each wall outlet and try to assign each amp to a specific job? Or safety training? Divide the safety meeting minutes by ….. ? It’s impossible. Which is why Vannevar Bush pioneered indirect costs. See the history section here:
> knock the Unites States off its perch as the world’s technological leader.
It's a funny thing. there is a distinct chauvinism to any citizen's nation. Every American is confident and absolutely positive that we are the best in so many categories. By what metrics? And who measures these? What about other nations who claim the top spot as well?
Before I travelled to Europe in 2008 I had some mental image of backwards, technologically inept populace that had old electronics and lagging standards and rickety brittle infrastructure. I mean you watch films and look at pictures and you see the roads and the old buildings and the funky cars and there's just a mix of things that are 500 years old or 1500 years back and thoroughly modern.
when I finally showed up in Spain I was completely disabused because all the electronics and the homes were totally modern and there were big box superstores that looked exactly like Target or safeway.
We went to shopping malls, watched normal first-run films in luxurious theaters that sold beer, and we rode around in cars/trains/boats, and I visited veterinarian and physician and hospital, and the medical treatment was indistinguishable from the American type.
I mean, this is one consumer's anecdata, but you've got to consider that we're ready to believe vague propaganda about #1 America First Outclassing The Solar System, and the fervent patriotism is perhaps not a 100% accurate lens.
Universities are designed to collect and disseminate knowledge worldwide. The top institutions and even the worst ones thrive on international collaboration. Think about how difficult it is to achieve and hold military superiority even. Schools are an effective equalizer, and globalist mindsets are the default.
the US is def not the best in many categories - though I suspect certain pockets of the US (overrepresented on HN) are like SV re: tech/quality of life and academia
many people I know - mostly [science/math/etc. denying] republicans think the US is the best at everything including healthcare (!!!) despite reams of data conclusively proving otherwise
my fingers are crossed that DOGE/Dump does something stupid enough to irritate the populace (and by extension a handful of senators/representatives to grow a mini-spine) enough to stop this destruction
Below the Ivy League and Premier type universities, many systems are based in/through a particular State, and so we could be more granular with a huge territory/populace and evaluate which States are ranked where for what types of research.
Further, it may be the case that Europe doesn't need/want a lot of high-tech, high-cost intellectual workers and opportunities that would drain brains from pools that do something more relevant, like soldiers, transport/shipping, or retail workers or HCPs.
in terms of scientific research though, America is ahead of much of Europe. It's historically been easier to get a good job in research in the US. Some research is also harder to carry out in Europe due to regulations. Now, whether the European lifestyle compares to the US is a different story. But when it comes to university-level research, it has been the case that there is just more money to throw toward it in the US, leading to more highly-cited papers. That might be changing, though.
First some basic math: if a project is budgeted at a direct cost of $500,000, the indirect rate of 60% applies to the $500,000, i.e. $300,000.
The total grant is thus $500K + $300K = $800K. The $300K indirect costs are thus 37.5% of the total. This is an upper limit, as many direct costs such as equipment do not get indirect rates applied to them.
Second, these rates are painstakingly negotiated with the NSF and NIH. Yearly audits to ensure compliance must be passed if funding is to continue.
Third, these indirect cost go towards to items such as electricity, heat, building maintenance, safety training and compliance, chemical disposal, and last by not least laboratory support services such as histology labs, proteomics core, compute infrastructure, and some full time staff scientific staff. Only a relatively small portion goes to administration.
Finally, scientists generally would welcome review and reform of indirect costs to ensure they get the maximize benefit from the indirect rates. However, DOGE is not interested in reform. They are interested in raze and burn destruction.
If DOGE gets its way, it will knock the Unites States off its perch as the world’s technological leader.