Federal Grants

A grant is a non repayable fond or product given by grant makers to a recipient. Grant makers are often, the government, corporations, foundations or trusts. The recipient is for example a educational institution, a individual or a business. A federal grant is economical aid issued by the United States government out of the general federal revenue. The government gives out grants to stimulate the economy and to provide public services. The government spends around 14o billion dollars a year to on grants. There are 26 government agencies that give out grants, a few of them are: Corporation for National and Community Service, Department of Agriculture, Department of Commerce, Department of Education, and the Department of Defense. There is a log of controversy about the grants given by the government because not everyone believes in the research that is being done using the government grants. Also a big problem is that politicians tend to reject science in order to gain votes. Politicians see some sciences and research as politically inconvenient and thus do not want them to happen. This greatly effects the grants given out by the government. Especially the republican party accuses grant makers of wasting tax money on useless research. Going forward I think it is important that not politicians but other scientists should decide on if a certain research is worth a government grant or not. In this way we make sure that politicians cant use science as part of their campaign and research is being done as it should be. Just like with the publication of research, where peers look at the research paper and decide if it is good enough to publicize, peers should also decide if certain research is worth government funding. Politicians do not know enough specifics about research to make decisions about this, peers do. This goes for grants in sciences, medicine, social sciences, and humanities.