Budget Cuts with Big Implications: The Threat to Thinking
By Logan Ignacio
When a government moves money away from an issue, it is effectively saying that the issue is less urgent or important than other facets of our society at any given time. Money talks, and it tells the rest of the world the priorities and values of whoever is wielding it. So, on March 20th, when Trump released an executive order to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education, he doubled down on a fact we have long suspected: he does not care about the future of education in our country.
The Department of Education was established in 1979, standing as the headquarters for the government’s role in education throughout the country and assisting in the execution of nationwide education policies. More specifically, it aims to ensure equal access to education for all, improve the quality of education, and hold federal education programs accountable to politicians and the general public. The DOE serves over millions of students in hundreds of thousands of schools, both public and private. Now, the entire program is in jeopardy.
The White House’s rationale for this order is that “more spending does not mean better education,” citing lower test scores over the past several decades despite per-pupil spending being up 245% from the 1970s. These facts are incredibly misleading—what else is up from the 70s? Costs. According to a calculator by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, $100 in 1970 has the buying power of almost $850 dollars today. This raise in prices is basically triple the increase in spending, meaning funding has not kept up with rising needs. For someone constantly fixating on inflation, Trump seems to neglect it when it fits his narrative. While throwing money at schools isn’t going to completely eradicate this problem, the need to erase this financial deficit is not only apparent, but necessary. President Trump and other members of the government might not understand this, but us students, we do.
I am fortunate enough to serve as a student representative on my school district’s board, and this opportunity has granted me a more developed insight and understanding of the negative consequences our government’s actions have on a local level. In short, it doesn’t take a special position to see the deficiencies public schools are operating in. We see it in our staff members who constantly get shifted between schools because new hires are too expensive, the ancient school buildings that are falling apart but we can’t get the money to repair, and the crammed buses we take to school because transportation costs are too high to add another bus route.
Trump hasn’t just attacked education, though. He is also cutting funding for science, a decision that has been deemed by some experts as his most dangerous for the future of America. Already, the administration has stripped grants from researchers at National Institutes for Health, universities, and other laboratories nationwide. These budget cuts affect institutions’ ability to get new materials, maintain their machinery and facilities, and pay for support staff, leading to sweeping, large-scale layoffs. The NIH is currently the world’s leading medical research facility, directing billions of dollars to cancer research annually; restricting money from this institution would put a damper on discoveries, a matter of life or death to millions of patients not just in our nation but around the world.
This isn’t the only way that less funding for science could harm society. Economists (across a broad range of the political spectrum) claim that financing scientific advancements is one of the most effective uses for tax paying money as this results in higher returns on investments than other channels of federal funding. Federal funding for research creates jobs, improves public health, supports national defense, aids in the development of infrastructure, and is responsible for many of the modern conveniences that our lives would be unrecognizable without. These benefits are widely known throughout not only the scientific community, but also amongst financial experts and analysts.
Some of the United States’ greatest accomplishments have been scientific—landing on the Moon and winning the Space Race, smartphones, and countless medical discoveries including penicillin and flu shots. As a country, we have a reputation for being a powerhouse of science and technology, a perception that attracts some of the best minds around the world. But, with each passing day, we stray further and further away from the values of innovation and advancement unless it’s immediately lucrative, despite them being a source of national pride and status on a global scale.
With emphasis being shifted away from education and science, this all begs the question: where is the money going? Where are our tax dollars going? Trump’s current plan includes redistributing the money going to the Department of Education and its functions to different agencies (the Treasury Department, Department of Agriculture, and individual states, for example), weakening the effectiveness of the programs. But more generally, government money is going to further Trump’s agenda. Billions are going towards efforts to crack down on immigration and facilitate even more misguided deportations, for one. Government authorities lead by example, and if they keep setting a precedent of negligence towards science and education, the country will follow suit. If we care about the future of our nation and world, we have to destroy this thinking before it destroys us.