The Trump administration’s recent cuts and disruptions to research funding and the scientific workforce are deeply troubling, as are the massive reductions proposed in the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’. These attacks on science threaten our ability to understand and address the big challenges that we face as a society, in addition to issues that impact communities like ours.
Growing up in Rockaway, my experiences during and following Hurricane Sandy shaped my journey to become a scientist. I witnessed the devastation, the slow recovery, and burdensome impacts on people here in Queens, and wondered how I could prevent other communities from having to face similar catastrophes. As a class project in grad school, I interviewed a dozen Rockaway residents about how Hurricane Sandy impacted their health. Now, as a PhD candidate at CUNY studying public health and the environment, I’ve contributed to peer-reviewed reports and publications about how environmental factors impact health in NYC, and I’m currently writing my dissertation about the health impacts of storms.
A lot of research on environmental issues like flooding and how communities can become more resilient to flood impacts is funded by the government through various agencies. These agencies include NASA, the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ proposes slashing these agencies’ budgets by unprecedented amounts. These cuts would endanger research on topics such as cancer, Alzheimer’s, infectious disease, and how to improve the health and wellbeing of older adults.
It’s also worth considering that “basic research,” which enhances our understanding of sometimes mundane topics, can be very fruitful – solutions to some societal problems have been found in unlikely places. For example, the Golden Goose Awards showcases work that seems obscure but has made a big impact, such as how modelling of human cognition in the ‘80s led to AI advancements in the 2010s, or how studying snails in the ‘70s led to the development of a new non-opioid pain reliever (ziconotide/Prialt). This research is often without profit in the short term, so some basic research might not happen at all without government funding, as private funders tend to prioritize short-term financial gains over long-term investments in progress (which do tend to pay off!).
In addition to innovation, there are economic benefits to investing in science. For every dollar invested in NIH government-funded research, there is more than twice that ($2.56) in economic activity generated, creating 30,000 jobs and $8B in economic impact just in NY, as estimated by United for Medical Research. Furthermore, economists have estimated that even a 25% cut in federal research funding – which is less than what is proposed in the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ – could result in a drop in the U.S. GDP (3.8%), almost as much as from the Great Recession.
The training of the next generation is also at stake – some of the grants that fund critical training programs for future scientists have been terminated. In the news, you may have heard about politically-motivated funding cuts at universities including Columbia and Harvard. These cuts have also hit CUNY hard, impacting not only research progress (which can be very wasteful) but also the job stability of many staff and student researchers. These cuts also reduce the opportunities available to the more than 250,000 CUNY students. As a CUNY undergraduate student, I was trained in a research experience for undergraduates funded by the National Science Foundation. As a graduate student, I was hired through a program with a training component funded by the Social Security Administration, a contract that was abruptly terminated in February. I now teach at CUNY, and as a result of the cuts, some of the career training programs that I have previously recommended to my students no longer exist.
To ensure a future where the U.S. can continue to lead in fields such as health, technology, and space exploration, our leaders at all levels of government must oppose these cuts. Please consider contacting your congressional representatives and make your concern regarding these issues known!
*Jenna Tipaldo resides in Far Rockaway and is a PhD student at the CUNY School of Public Health.
