SSTI Digest

The Biden-Harris administration recently announced new actions to lower health care and prescription drug costs by promoting competition. These actions include a proposed framework that encourages agencies to use march-in rights to lower the price of prescription medicines. The proposed framework encourages agencies to consider price as a factor in determining whether a drug is genuinely accessible to the public. Prescription drugs cost more in the U.S. than elsewhere, even though taxpayers' dollars support federal research. Each year, U.S. taxpayers contribute more than $40 billion to the National Institutes of Health, according to the NIH budget webpage, while, as the White House fact sheet announcing the new actions points out, nearly three in ten individuals struggle to pay for the drugs they need. The fact sheet notes, “(w)hen an invention is made using taxpayer funds, under certain circumstances march-in authority under the Bayh-Dole Act enables the federal government to license the invention to another party.” The directive refutes a proposed rule change by the previous administration, which the Biden administration decided not to finalize earlier this…

Countries participating in the COP28 climate summit agreed this week to call for "transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems…”  Earlier this year, researchers at Nature Communications said a full transition from fossil fuels could displace 1.7 million fossil fuel workers in the United States and an even greater number on the global scale. In anticipation, employees, unions, and policymakers are seeking a “Just Transition” in which fossil fuel workers receive public support to find new lines of work. Researchers Junghyun Lim, Michaël Aklin and Morgan R. Frank ask whether fossil fuel workers need re-skilling to perform green jobs in America. The authors compare the skill requirements of fossil fuel occupations to the occupations in other industries using Jaccard similarity, a statistic used for gauging the similarity and diversity of sample sets. They found that fossil fuel workers do indeed have significantly more skill similarity to green industry occupations than they would to other industries, as shown in Figure 1. Figure 1: Chart A compares the skills of fossil fuel workers and Chart B…

A new report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) studies a sample of 198 Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) awards from FY 2019 to identify subcontracting activity. SBIR recipients are generally allowed to subcontract up to 50% of their award value, and STTR recipients must contract at least 30% with a nonprofit research institution. GAO found that 30% of Phase II awards included no subcontract, 24% included at least one subcontract with an academic institution, and 23% included at least one subcontract with a large business (including many defense contractors). The study also found marked differences between the Department of Defense, with 55% of Phase II awards including at least one subcontract, and civilian agencies, which saw subcontracts in 82% of awards. The purpose of GAO’s study was to determine the share of SBIR/STTR recipients reporting subcontractors in the Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act of 2006 (FFATA) Subaward Reporting System (FSRS). While the agency estimates that only 10% of awards reported subcontracts, GAO notes that compliance is low across all federal programs and…

A new report from NASBO (National Association of State Budget Officers), State Expenditures Report for Fiscal Years 2021-2023, finds while spending remains elevated compared to pre-pandemic levels, it is starting to slow. Spending from states’ funds rose 12.3% in FY2023 as a result of states spending surplus funds. Among the  key findings of the report: Total state spending for FYFY 2023 is projected at $2.96 trillion—an increase from $2.78 trillion in FYFY 2022—and represents a total state spending growth of 6.5% (with a median growth rate of 7.5%).   During this same period (FY 2023), federal funds declined 1.8%, with a median growth rate of 0.2%. The decline is related to states expending their Coronavirus Aid Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding and much of the American Rescue Plan Act or ARPA funding. And although federal funding declined during this time, it remains higher than pre-pandemic levels.   In FY 2022, total state spending grew 4.6% (the median growth rate being 8%), with spending from the state’s funds at 8.8% (6.9% on a median basis). However, when looking solely at the states’ general fund spending (…

Fifty-seven percent of Americans say science has had a mostly positive effect on society, according to a recent report from the Pew Research Center. While the percentage of those with favorable views of science might seem like good news, the number is significantly less than at the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak in January 2019, when 73% of Americans declared positive views. Confidence that scientists will act for society's benefit has also declined. The Pew survey highlights differences in survey responses between Democrats and Republicans. The decline in the number of Republicans who say science has had a mostly positive effect on society is significant. The percentage of Republicans with a positive view of science’s effect on society has dropped from 70% in January 2019 to only 47% in October 2023. (All percentages for Republicans and Democrats in this article include independents who lean towards the respective parties.) In 2023, the number of Democrats who believe science has had a mostly positive effect on society still outnumbers the number of Republicans who have the same opinion: 69% of Democrats expressed this positive view of science on society in the…

The U.S. Department of the Treasury recently approved 20 additional state awards under the State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI) Technical Assistance Grant Program, totaling more than $50.8 million. These awards will provide legal, accounting, and financial advisory services to eligible small businesses applying for the SSBCI capital program and other government small business programs. SSBCI includes funding for technical assistance to help very small businesses—defined as businesses with fewer than ten employees, including independent contractors and sole proprietors—and underserved small businesses apply for the SSBCI Capital Program and other government small business programs. The Treasury Department’s SSBCI Technical Assistance Grant Program and the newly announced SSBCI Investing in America Small Business Opportunity Program are designed to complement the SSBCI Capital Program. Awards were made in AK, AZ, AR, ID, IN, IA, LA, ME, MD, MI, MS, NH, ND, PA, RI, SC, TN, VA, WA, WI. These awards join 12 others that were announced in August 2023. Examples of the technical assistance awards include: Michigan, specifically the Michigan…

A new report finds that state agencies face challenges when working to implement Justice40 goals. Justice40 is an initiative included in President Biden’s Executive Order 14008, signed on January 27, 2021. The initiative laid out the goal that 40% of the overall benefits of certain federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution. The order stipulated that government agencies consult with disadvantaged communities to find the best ways to achieve this goal. To determine how states are navigating federal guidelines to date, the Environmental Policy Innovation Center (EPIC), Climate Xchange, and Beech Hill Research interviewed state agency staff nationwide working on Justice40 programs. Their research report highlights state workers' obstacles and provides insights into what needs to be done to meet the Justice40 goals. “State staff underscored that soliciting projects/applications from historically underserved areas is a crucial but difficult piece of delivering on Justice40,” the researchers note. “While state staff have some capacity for outreach and leveraging existing partnerships, they…

Data center technology processing passed the milestone of consuming 1% of world energy in 2010 and is projected to increase to 6% by 2030, according to a 2020 Science magazine study  by Eric Masanet, Arman Shehabi, Nuoa Lei, Sarah Smith, and Jonathan Koomey. The authors suggest that governments may need to take on a more considered approach to expanding data centers to meet the growing demand. State and local economic developers offering incentives to recruit data centers may want to take particular note. The non-captured costs, or externalities, of information processing hubs are mounting as the pace of human-induced climate change increases.     According to The MIT Press Reader, the cloud now has a greater carbon footprint than the airline industry. At 200 terawatt hours (TWh) annually, all existing data centers combined  devour more energy than even some nation-states. Electricity use and associated carbon emissions are just two external concerns. A Washington Post article reports a large data center can gobble up anywhere between one million and five million gallons of water daily—as much as a town of 10,000 to 50,000…

Institutions of higher education spent $97.8 billion on research and development (R&D) activities in fiscal year (FY) 2022, an increase of nearly 9% over the prior year’s $89.8 billion. Over the past decade of available data, from FY 2013-2022, higher education R&D expenditures have increased 46%, from $67.1 to $97.8 billion. However, when adjusted for inflation, the growth is more modest at 17%. This edition of Useful Stats explores the most recent Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) Survey release of 2022 data. Specifically, this article uses data from the past ten years of HERD in current and inflation-adjusted dollars, alongside a breakdown of HERD by the source of funds.   HERD over the past decade Over the past decade, higher education R&D expenditures have increased by an average of 4% per year. HERD expenditures have increased every year since FY 2013, while the most recent years, from FY 2021-2022, had the most significant increase at 9%. However, when adjusted for inflation, HERD expenditures increased an average of 2% per year, and saw decreases from FY 2013-2014 (-2%) and 2020-2021 (-1%). Figure…

Setting aside multibillion fraud and the large black market economy, cryptomining inflicts pain to society in quieter ways as well, research found. In a nutshell, cryptocurrencies contribute more negative externalities that impact individual wallets and global warming, stemming from the intensive electricity requirements to complete each unregulated transaction. Taking a single cryptocurrency as an example, the annual global electricity consumption of Bitcoin mining was approximately 95.58 terawatt-hours in May 2023, according to Techopedia. Energy-sage reports that as of February 2023, the US national average electricity rate is 23 cents per kilowatt-hours, which (using an energy calculator) would translate to bitcoin mining using an average of $21.9 billion in energy every year. Not all those energy costs are borne by Bitcoin, the research revealed. A column by Vox EU aimed to find the impact of this technology processing on local economies, as this reality has not only led to a race among firms who run large cryptomines but has also resulted in externalities foisting extra costs onto the surrounding economies. The column noted that most cryptocurrencies turn…

Under Secretary of Commerce for Standards and Technology and National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Director Laurie E. Locascio recently revealed in public comments that approximately $3 billion in funding for the National Advanced Packaging Manufacturing Program will be used to drive U.S. leadership in advanced packaging. Advanced packaging is a cutting-edge design and manufacturing method that places multiple chips with a variety of functions in a densely interconnected two- or three-dimensional “package.” This design paradigm, according to a press release from NIST,  “can help the sector achieve the ever denser, smaller dimensions that the most advanced semiconductors require.” But NIST also notes that “currently, the United States is limited in both conventional and advanced packaging capacity.”  NAPMP will be dedicated to activities that include an advanced packaging piloting facility for validating and transitioning new technologies to U.S. manufacturers; workforce training programs to ensure that new processes and tools are capably staffed; and funding for projects that focus on:   materials and substrates,…

Restrictions placed on registering for high-wage-potential academic majors have had an increasingly disproportionate adverse effect on students from underrepresented minority groups (URM: Black, Hispanic, and American Indian or Alaska Native), according to research from the Bookings Institution. The Brookings researchers arrived at their conclusions after assigning a measurement (wage-premium) of how much more—or less—a student might expect to earn depending on the major they complete. Then, they examined the wage-premium gap between URM and non-URM students. In the 1990s, that gap was less than 1%. However, the gap tripled between 2009 and 2019. They concluded that this gap showed that "URM college graduates' college majors alone may be widening the wage gap between URM and non-URM graduates by about 2.5% or about 10% of the average wage gap between the two groups." These gaps exist among graduates from such high-wage-potential majors as computer science, business, economics, engineering, and nursing students earn higher wages than graduates from different majors. The increasing demand for high-wage-potential college majors has made restrictions on college…