Science definitely needs a bigger budget. There's some interesting math to do here: if the number $300 billion is an accurate estimate of taxpayer cost, and the

Science definitely needs a bigger budget. There's some interesting math to do here: if the number $300 billion is an accurate estimate of taxpayer cost, and the quick Google I did on the number of taxpayers in the US is correct at 144.3 million, then that means the average cost to an individual taxpayer is about $2,080/year. Which is 1/7 the cost of my own university/student loan expenses, even after financial aid, grants, scholarships, etc. My local public college is $2,800/year. In other words, if these numbers are all correct, then the cost to each taxpayer is less than the cost of public college, and much less than the cost of private universities. And when you consider that students at more expensive universities are more likely to have larger student loans, it shifts the average costs being paid off higher, meaning taxpayers are paying much less than people going to college would need to pay. Obviously this is a simplification, and there are things to consider such as how this is covering everyone who's ever been to college in the US before and hasn't finished paying their loans (as opposed to just the people with new loans, which a policy like this would eventually settle into being).