3 ms·

I don’t know much about this stuff, so probably a silly question. Why the heck would Yale or Harvard need so much federal funding? For how much students pay an

I don’t know much about this stuff, so probably a silly question. Why the heck would Yale or Harvard need so much federal funding? For how much students pay and how many wealthy donors they have, why are tax payers funding Yale? This is probably one of the rare times I support a funding cut.

dragonwriter 2y ago
> I don’t know much about this stuff, so probably a silly question. Why the heck would Yale or Harvard need so much federal funding? All universities are research institutions and the funding at issue are research grants. > For how much students pay and how many wealthy donors they have, why are tax payers funding Yale? Students pay basically for the costs associated with having students at the university, but that's not the primary function of the university. > This is probably one of the rare times I support a funding cut. Yeah, I mean, if you qant to slit the throat of progress in all fields of science, that makes a lot of sense.
RickJWagner 2y ago
It does seem egregious, especially considering the elite status of the institutions ( with ‘legacy’ admissions to hand down the privilege. ) Making blue collar workers pay taxes to fund elite education for nepotism-babies seems like something bad.
UncleMeat 2y ago
Federal funding for universities is not "free cash for universities to subsidize students." When people talk about federal funding we are talking about research funding. The NSF decides that they want to fund research on topic X for reason Y. They put a call for grant applications. Labs submit grant applications and the NSF chooses the ones they think are most valuable. Those labs get money to pay for faculty and grad student salaries and lab equipment. The labs perform the research and publish it for the broader societal good.

3 ms·

I don’t know much about this stuff, so probably a silly question. Why the heck would Yale or Harvard need so much federal funding? For how much students pay an

by iJohnDoe 2y ago

dragonwriter 2y ago
> I don’t know much about this stuff, so probably a silly question. Why the heck would Yale or Harvard need so much federal funding? All universities are research institutions and the funding at issue are research grants. > For how much students pay and how many wealthy donors they have, why are tax payers funding Yale? Students pay basically for the costs associated with having students at the university, but that's not the primary function of the university. > This is probably one of the rare times I support a funding cut. Yeah, I mean, if you qant to slit the throat of progress in all fields of science, that makes a lot of sense.
RickJWagner 2y ago
It does seem egregious, especially considering the elite status of the institutions ( with ‘legacy’ admissions to hand down the privilege. ) Making blue collar workers pay taxes to fund elite education for nepotism-babies seems like something bad.
UncleMeat 2y ago
Federal funding for universities is not "free cash for universities to subsidize students." When people talk about federal funding we are talking about research funding. The NSF decides that they want to fund research on topic X for reason Y. They put a call for grant applications. Labs submit grant applications and the NSF chooses the ones they think are most valuable. Those labs get money to pay for faculty and grad student salaries and lab equipment. The labs perform the research and publish it for the broader societal good.