Yesterday the Senate defeated Tom Coburn's amendment to kill the National Science Foundation's political science program -- which had my colleagues up in arms -- by a 62-36 vote that broke down largely along party lines:
Party | Yes | No |
Democrats | 5 | 53 |
Republicans | 31 | 9 |
To understand the vote breakdown better, we can use this graphic, which was automatically generated by Royce Carroll using the Lewis-Poole Optimal Classification estimates for the 111th Senate:
Each senator is placed at their estimated ideal point in the ideological space. The diagonal cutting line, which represents the best-fitting line dividing yes from no votes in the space, indicates that the vote reflected both the primary ideological division between the parties (in this case, cutting "wasteful" government spending) and the second "social issues" dimension (feelings toward pointy-headed academics?).
For a different perspective, here are regional breakdowns of the vote from Govtrack.us with both a standard US map and one that is deformed to give each state equal area:
Note to Senator Coburn: This post was not funded by the NSF.
Update 11/9 7:02 AM: Stanford's Simon Jackman posted this graphic portraying the relationship between estimated ideal points along the primary ideological dimension* and the Coburn vote (click the graphic for a larger version):
It's especially useful for distinguishing the senators whose votes are not well-explained by their estimated ideal points in the first dimension.
* Jackman's estimates come from the Clinton-Jackman-Rivers algorithm for scaling roll call votes, which differs slightly from the Lewis-Poole algorithm used to produce the circular graphic above.
As I recall, the NSF was established in the wake of the Sputnik launch with the purpose of keeping the US ahead of the Soviet Union in technology. The word "science" is a part of "political science", but this isn't the kind of hard science that the NSF was supposed to be about.
Posted by: David | November 06, 2009 at 11:35 AM
well played brendan. Can't believe that Bond voted against amendment but Mccaskill voted for. I think that retiring Bond is just like f'it; I'm just drinking now.
Posted by: Brian F. | November 06, 2009 at 12:00 PM
The president of the American Political Science Association was understandably pleased at the outcome of the vote.
Posted by: Rob | November 06, 2009 at 12:17 PM
David,
If you want the NSF only to fund what it "was supposed to be about," and it was "established ... with the purpose of keeping the US ahead of the Soviet Union in technology," doesn't that mean the NSF should have been shut down in 1989?
Posted by: brenton | November 06, 2009 at 12:29 PM
This post shows political science expertise used to analyze how political science gets money from the govenment. Political science techniques may or may not benefit the public, but at least they benefit political scientists. :)
IMHO it's appropriate for the government to pay for functions that are in the public interest, such as environmental protection. It's reasonable for the government to help people in need, via welfare, food stamps, unemployment insurance, etc. It may even be appropriate for the government to sometimes perform private-sector-type functions, such as TVA or Medicare. However, I don't see why a government with deep deficits should go even deeper into debt in order to fund political science research. If the NSF stopped giving money to political scientists I don't think the general public would be harmed.
Posted by: David | November 06, 2009 at 04:55 PM
I don't see why a government with deep deficits should go even deeper into debt in order to fund political science research.
The entire NSF budget is about $6 billion per year. That's a fraction of a percent of total expenditures. You could cancel the whole program and it would make no difference to the federal budget deficit.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 06, 2009 at 05:27 PM
Jinchi, I think you've got it backwards. A budget surplus would more easily justify giving money to non-essential areas. A deficit demands greater attention to spending money carefully.
Every nickel of our huge national debt will have to be paid back, by us or by our childen. The process of paying back the debt and the interest to carry the debt will be painful. It will take money from other areas now supported by the government. If the national debt is small, we may be able to deal with it without cutting the most important government spending. But, a larger debt will wind up depriving areas of more urgent need.
Posted by: David | November 06, 2009 at 11:11 PM
Time for a National Strike. Let's see what non-producing political 'scientist' parasites will find for food when producers stop producing.
Posted by: Mike M | November 08, 2009 at 02:49 AM
A deficit demands greater attention to spending money carefully.
David, you can make an argument about defunding the NSF. But claiming it's being done to address the deficit is silly. You're not going to pay off your mortgage any faster by giving up your daily tic-tac, and we're not going to pay off our national debt any faster by canceling funding for political science. Tiny fluctuations in the interest rate are going to more than make up for the difference.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 08, 2009 at 08:26 AM
Jinchi, I'm not sure what you mean by "address the deficit"? If you mean talking about the deficit, then I agree. A slightly larger deficit would be described the same way as a slightly smaller one. However, if we're conerned with the actual consequences, that's a different story.
Government spending tends to reduce the number jobs available. That's because businesses seek to avoid the high taxes needed needed to support big government. That's particularly the case given that many industries American companies have to compete with foreign companies. E.g., in my field most American reinsurance companies moved to Bermuda to avoid US income tax.
Let's suppose the money spent on political science results in an unemployment rate of 11.001%, rather than 11.000%. If we're merely talking about unemployment, there's no difference. In either case, we'd describe the unemployment rate as "around 11%".
However, if we're concerned about actual human beings, that infinitesimally higher rate means 1000 more people are unemployed, with all the suffering that situation causes them and their families.
Posted by: David | November 08, 2009 at 11:08 AM
The Democrats are going to address the deficit in much the same way that Ed Norton addressed the ball (at 2:16).
Posted by: Rob | November 08, 2009 at 06:32 PM
Government spending tends to reduce the number jobs available.
This is simply not true. Even in your example, having a post office box in Bermuda is hardly the same thing as having jobs relocate to Bermuda. Any employees living and working in America still get counted in the positive column.
Let's suppose the money spent on political science results in an unemployment rate of 11.001%, rather than 11.000%.
And even if I accepted your highly dubious premise that funding political science (to the tune of a few million per year) costs 1000 American jobs, the same logic argues that the annual spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has cost us over 10,000,000 jobs this year. In other words, Obama could end the unemployment crisis (and then some) simply by canceling the war.
I don't believe that for a second, and I doubt you do, either.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 09, 2009 at 12:59 AM
Jinchi, the jobs are in Bermuda. Under US tax law, a Bermuda company with a "US place of business" would have to pay US income tax. That term is not precisely defined, so Bermuda companies bend over backwards to be sure that they don't have any of their work done in the United States. They can have subsidiaries in the US, but the parent company in Bermuda needs to be a real functioning organization, not just a local attorney and a PO box.
I would agree that wars are very costly to the economy. A huge amount of effort and raw materials go into making stuff that gets destroyed. We'd all be wealthier if that effort and material went into making consumer goods.
Posted by: David | November 09, 2009 at 01:08 PM
Jinchi, the jobs are in Bermuda.
If you're saying that the workers are physically residing in Bermuda, then your original argument (jobs are moving overseas) is simply not true for most of the American economy and absolutely not in the numbers that would be required to blame political science funding for the loss of 1,000 workers.
But any workers living in the United States are counted as employed (and most of them are paying U.S. taxes) regardless of where their company is based.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 09, 2009 at 04:10 PM
Jinchi, I merely gave Bermuda as an example with which I was familiar. American workers residing in Bermuda get some exclusion, but do pay American income tax on the bulk of their earnings. I suspect that they may avoid state income tax. The company I consult with was founded by Americans and is traded on the NYSE. As a consultant I pay full US and CA income tax.
OTOH most of their employees are not American and thus pay no US income tax. Also, the company itself pays no US income tax (although its US subsidiary pays some US income tax.) In total, the US loses tens of millions of dollars annually that they would have been collected if this company were domiciled in the US.
It's hard to prove that higher taxes cause fewer jobs, because there's no way to tie a particular job loss to a particular tax increase. It si the case that high tax countries tend to have higher unemployment rates than low tax countries. For example, Spain now has an unemployment rate of 19%. I believe that if Obama-care and Cap 'n Trade pass our unemployment rates will climb.
The same relationship holds between states. E.g., high tax CA has 12.2% unemployment as of Sept., 2009, while no-income-tax TX has only 8.2% unemployment.
Posted by: David | November 09, 2009 at 05:07 PM
It's hard to prove that higher taxes cause fewer jobs, because there's no way to tie a particular job loss to a particular tax increase.
Not at all. You claimed that increased spending (resulting in higher taxes) causes increased unemployment. Why would you bother comparing the United States to Spain? Just compare the unemployment rate in the United States relative to increases in federal spending (or to the corporate tax rate). They don't track one another.
You're also cherry-picking your low-tax/high-tax states. High tax Vermont is doing as well as Live-Free-or-Die New Hampshire (both near the top with regards to unemployment). Texas is in the middle, hardly better off than New York or Massachusetts. Unemployment rates in income tax free Florida and Tennessee are among the worst in the country. And Nevada is doing significantly worse than California, despite also having no income tax.
Just compare a map of unemployment in the states to a map of states with no income tax. They don't look anything like one another.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 09, 2009 at 09:26 PM
Actually, the average unemployment rate is considerably lower in states without income tax. Also, one must look at corporate income tax rates, which don't always track with individual rates.
I looked up the unemployment figures at http://www.bls.gov/web/laumstrk.htm
Alaska 8.4
Nevada 13.3
Washington 10.5
Wyoming 6.8
South Dakota 4.8
Texas 8.2
Florida 11.0
Countrywide 9.8%
The largest state here with above average unemployment is Florida. However, according to this source http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/230.html Florida has a 5.5% comporate income tax. Also, taxpayers who owe AMT must pay FL income tax.
It's true that not every state without an income tax has lower than average unemployment. But, 4 out of 6 do. If averaged over the number of people, the result would be more striking, since Texas is so much larger than the other states here.
Posted by: David | November 10, 2009 at 11:00 AM
David, even your own references don't support your argument. (First of only 3 of your 6 states have better than average employment rates, not 4).
But more to the point:
Take the unemployment numbers at the BLS site. Plot them relative to the corporate tax rate from the Tax Foundation. What you'll see is a nice shotgun pattern. There is no correlation between corporate tax rate and the unemployment rate.
You can do the same thing relative to income tax and you'll get fundamentally the same result.
Posted by: Jinchi | November 10, 2009 at 03:11 PM