Rivkin / Brown / Chandler Technology Unbound

Transferring Scientific and Engineering Resources from Defense to Civilian Purposes
1. Auflage 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4831-8420-3
Verlag: Elsevier Science & Techn.
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 116 Seiten

Technology Unbound: Transferring Scientific and Engineering Resources from Defense to Civilian Purposes talks about the reallocation of U.S. military resources for use in the civilian sector. The title analyzes implications of the resource adjustment to the U.S. economy. The text first covers the interplay between science, military, and economy. In the second chapter, the selection deals with the impact of the resource reallocation to industries, communities, scientists, and engineers. The next chapter details the needs of the U.S. civilian sector. The last chapter presents the prospects for adjustment. The book will be of great interest to military and government officials, economists, and political scientists.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Rivkin, Steven R.

Brown, R.

Chandler, G.

Davis, W. A.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1;Front Cover;1
2;Technology Unbound: Transferring Scientific and Engineering Resources from Defense to Civilian Purposes;4
3;Copyright Page;5
4;Table of Contens;8
5;Dedication;6
6;FOREWORD;10
7;PREFACE;12
8;INTRODUCTION;16
9;CHAPTER I. SCIENCE, DEFENSE AND THE AMERICAN ECONOMY;24
9.1;1. DEFENSE AND THE ECONOMY;25
9.2;2. SCIENCE AND DEFENSE;30
9.3;3. AMERICAN EXPERIENCE WITH DEFENSE CONVERSION;34
9.4;4. THE MARKET FOR SCIENCE;39
10;CHAPTER II. PROBLEMS OF ADJUSTMENT;44
10.1;1. THE IMPACT ON INDUSTRIES;44
10.2;2. THE IMPACT ON SCIENTISTS AND ENGINEERS;67
10.3;3. THE IMPACT ON COMMUNITIES;71
11;CHAPTER III. TECHNOLOGY UNBOUND: THE NEEDS AND OPPORTUNITIES;76
11.1;1. IMPROVING THE URBAN ENVIRONMENT;78
11.2;2. MODERNIZING THE NATION'S TRANSPORTATION;83
11.3;3. MEETING HEALTH NEEDS;87
11.4;4. PROTECTING THE ENVIRONMENT;88
11.5;5. METEOROLOGY AND OCEANOGRAPHY;91
11.6;6. SPACE;94
11.7;7. THE CONTEXT FOR INNOVATION;96
12;CHAPTER IV. THE PROSPECTS FOR ADJUSTMENT;102
13;REFERENCES;112

Leseproben

CHAPTER I

SCIENCE, DEFENSE AND THE AMERICAN ECONOMY

Publisher Summary

This chapter provides an overview of science, defense, and the American economy. By any measure, defense is a major claimant on American resources, both of money and of men. For most of the past two decades, defense expenditures have constituted more than half of the Federal Budget. Increasingly, the purchase of goods and services for defense has come to rely upon scientific and technical research and development to underpin the design and production of weapons. Through the mechanisms of contracts and grants to private institutions—corporations and universities—the Federal Government has underwritten the cost of most of this research and development needed for defense purposes. The result has been intense mutual involvement between the Federal Government and American scientists and engineers in which the procurement of research and development for national security purposes plays a major role. While the statistics indicate the magnitude of this mutual dependence, they must be heavily qualified to be properly understood. Motivations other than defense and sources of sponsorship other than the defense agencies of the Federal Government stand ready to absorb at least a significant part of the slack resources of scientific and engineering talent freed by an arms cutback in the light of the magnitude of accumulated unsatisfied needs in American society that research and development resources could serve.

BY ANY measure, defense is a major claimant on American resources, both of money and of men. For most of the last two decades, defense expenditures have constituted more than half of the Federal Budget. Increasingly, the purchase of goods and services for defense has come to rely upon scientific and technical research and development to underpin the design and production of weapons. Through the mechanisms of contracts and grants to private institutions — corporations and universities — the Federal Government has underwritten the cost of most of this research and development needed for defense purposes. The result has been intense mutual involvement between the Federal Government and American scientists and engineers in which the procurement of research and development for national security purposes plays a major role.

While the statistics indicate the magnitude of this mutual dependence, they must be heavily qualified to be properly understood. First of all, it must be emphasized that the conduct of science in the United States is by no means wholly dependent upon government support; that other motivations aside from national security and other agencies aside from the Department of Defense , the Atomic Energy Commission , and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration support science and technology; and that much of the work done under defense-motivated sponsorship, especially basic research, would warrant and would probably receive public support for other purposes and from other Federal agencies were the defense motivation not present. As will be demonstrated subsequently, motivations other than defense and sources of sponsorship other than the defense agencies of the Federal Government stand ready to absorb at least a significant part of the slack resources of scientific and engineering talent freed by an arms cutback in the light of the magnitude of accumulated unsatisfied needs in American society that research and development resources could serve. But this conclusion is by no means inexorable, for it assumes adequate compensatory public policies to maintain aggregate demand for goods and services and the readiness of the society as a whole to channel its unique inventive resources to achieve particular non-defense objectives. So while the dependence of science on defense may be intense, it is not total. Moreover, the linkage appears to be sufficiently elastic to justify the conclusion that there exists a high degree of potential transferability between defense and other potential goals and sources of sponsorship for American science and technology that requires only opportunity and determination to make real.

1 DEFENSE AND THE ECONOMY

During the past decade, Federal expenditures on goods and services in the combined defense, space and atomic energy fields have amounted to about 9-10 per cent of the gross national product (see Tables 1 and 2) and 85-90 per cent of total Federal purchases of goods and services. About 6.6 million persons (more than 9 per cent of the nation’s labor force) are engaged in defense and defense-related activities, 2.8 million as civilians in private industry, about a million as civilians employed by the Department of Defense, and the remainder in the armed services.

TABLE 1

DEFENSE, SPACE AND ATOMIC ENERGY BUDGET EXPENDITURES OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND RELATION TO GNP, 1945-65

Fiscal Year

Amount (billions of $S)

Per Cent of GNP

1945

81.3

37.2

1946

43.3

21.4

1947

14.4

6.4

1948

11.8

4.8

1949

13.0

5.0

1950

13.1

5.0

1951

22.5

7.2

1952

44.1

13.0

1953

50.5

14.0

1954

47.1

13.0

1955

40.8

10.8

1956

40.8

10.0

1957

43.4

10.0

1958

44.3

10.1

1959

46.6

10.0

1960

46.1

9.3

1961

48.2

9.5

1962

52.4

9.7

1963

55.3

9.7

1964

58.4

9.7

1965

55.2

8.6

Source: Defense , July 1965 (Washington U.S.G.P. O., 1965) p. 9.

TABLE 2

ADMINISTRATIVE BUDGET EXPENDITURES FOR NATIONAL DEFENSE AND SPACE FUNCTIONS, FISCAL YEARS 1954-1955 (Millions of dollars)

National defense & space

47,076

40,769

40,794

43,444

44,323

46,628

46,092

48,238

52,360

55,307

58,352

55,237

National defense

46,986

40,695

40,723

43,368

44,234

46,483

45,691

47,494

51,103

52,755

54,181

50,143

DoD, military2

43,955

37,823

38,403

40,788

41,258

43,563

42,824

44,676

48,205

49,973

51,245

47,382

Defense-related activities3

1136

1015

669

590

709

379

244

104

92

24

172

137

Atomic energy4

1895

1857

1651

1990

2208

2541

2623

2713

2806

2758

2765

2624

Space research and technology5

90

74

71

76

89

145

401

744

1,257

2,552

4,171

5,094

1Preliminary expenditures released July 21, 1965.

2Includes military assistance.

3Includes stockpiling of strategic and critical materials, expansion of defense production, Selective Service System, and emergency preparedness activities.

4Includes the following expenditures (in millions of dollars), which Atomic Energy Commission considers for nondefense purposes: 1954, 72; 1955, 163; 1956, 243; 1957, 361; 1958, 358; 1959, 524; 1960, 579; 1961, 665; 1962, 768; 1963, 814; 1964, 910; 1965, 1293; 1966, 1193. The budget expenditure figures shown in this table include expenditures for cost of operation for facilities and for plant and equipment.

5National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics prior to 1959 and National Aeronautics and Space Administration thereafter.

Source: Corrected from , July 1965 (Washington, U.S.G.P.O.), p. 76; figures drawn from Treasury Department, Bureau of the Budget, and Atomic Energy Commission.

Defense * work is heavily concentrated in certain key industries. Five categories of manufacturing industry are estimated to be dependent...