In assessing the performance of academic research, there is a growing interest in combining
excellence with impact criteria. A frequently encountered belief is that impact should be …

How much should a nation spend on science? What kind of science? How much from
private versus public sectors? Does demand for funding by potential science performers …

University research has propelled the United States into world-class leadership, but
continuing that momentum in the 21st century requires major funding. Both the public and …

The enactment of the America COMPETES Act in 2006 (and its reauthorization in 2010), the
increase in research expenditures under the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment …

Evident in recent requests by policy-makers for evidence about the effectiveness and
impacts of public-sector R&D programs and associated calls for a science of science policy …

Getting science policy right is a core objective of government that bears on scientific
advance, economic growth, health, and longevity. Yet the process of science is changing. As …

Expansion of public energy R&D budgets continues to be a key component of climate policy.
Using an original data set of both scientific articles and patents pertaining to three alternative …

This paper overviews the growth of basic research in the second half of the twentieth
century, and its gradual recent transformation toward applied research. The paper shows …

The National Science Foundation (NSF) evaluates grant proposals based on two criteria:
intellectual merit and broader impacts. NSF gives applicants wide latitude to choose among …

New ideas no longer fuel economic growth the way they once did. A popular explanation for
stagnation is that good ideas are harder to find, rendering slowdown inevitable. We present …