1. Amount paid out in bonuses to the UK banking sector in 2009-10 = £7bn
2. Total UK Science budget for the same year = £3bn.

Now tell me there’s not enough money.

One popular theory is that political correctness prevents us challenging minority cultures.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2006/aug/15/highereducation.students

Do you live in the UK? I’d like to hear theories to explain why British students don’t accept evolution. In the US the answer would be the influence of religion in the culture. The UK is generally considered post-Christian at this point, so why would students reject accepted science?

As another poster said – the piggy bank is empty. If you don’t cut this, what do you want to cut instead? Or do you prefer to continue printing more IOU’s?

As an engineering manager I was stopped cold when I explained the logic of a RIF when a smart-ass asked me “So did we purposely hire on a normal distribution so we knew from the start who to eventually get rid of?”

Typical Objectionable Objectivist fail

http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa061698.htm

http://books.google.com/books?id=_ykfBAWBkxoC&pg=PA2&lpg=PA2&dq=burk+goldstein+and+von+neumann&source=bl&ots=ZkqQjwCv38&sig=C7pm2SrFPkcKL_SmrpmIKVwaE-4&hl=en&ei=q_SpTOH7KsKBlAfNg8W0DQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CBYQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false

Running out of people willing to lend it to them? 10 year UK bond rates are below 3%! In the US they are around 2.5%! People are lining up and BEGGING governments to borrow their money and do useful things with it, almost for free. When money can be borrowed so cheaply it is criminal for governments not to take advantage of the opportunity and invest in long-term growth, including basic science and education.

The idea that the absolutely miniscule science budget is somehow the appropriate and neccessary place to reduce spending in times of austerity is just wrong. It’s no better than deficite spending in terms of selling out the future for present gain.

This is why Germany after two decades of debt fuelled reunification has heavily invested in science again in the last years. This is an uncontroversial move with broad public support.

Also, Science is Vital was started by another science blogger, Jennifer Rohn: http://blogs.nature.com/ue19877e8/

1) the PIGS countries aside, former first world countries aren’t even in the yellow debt zone. They could deficit spend if they wanted to, which is typically advised during an economic downturn. Ending the recession will cut debts more than anything else.

2) Also, especially in the US and the UK, taxes could simply go up, especially on the upper classes. Thatcherite and Reaganite upperclass tax cuts haven’t had their promised trickle down effects, and are the real origin of the account deficits.

3) As spyder notes, the cuts could be coming from the military.

http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2010/10/bill-bryson-science-amount

Your graph divides by GDP. Try this one. GDP includes government spending. National debt doesn’t include PFIs or personal debt. (Although I would agree it’s more complicated than that.)

Britain only retains its credit rating because its government chose to do something about the debt. Yes, you’re right. It has everything to do with political dogma. There’s the dogma of the ‘credit card generation’ who spend to the max and only start to think of it as real money when all the cards are maxed out and the bailiffs are knocking on the door, and the dogma of those who don’t borrow unless they have a plan to pay it back.

It’s true, we’re not in the same situation as we were in the great depression, World War II, or post-war rationing. But that’s not really a recommendation.

http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt_chart.html

and most of the debt we have has a long date, unlike Greece and Ireland. This is why Britain retains an AAA credit rating.

The cuts are nothing to do with economic necessity and everything to do with political dogma.

But there’s no money left.

You can’t spend money you don’t have. Even in the good times, you can’t spend more on science than you’ve got. You can’t invest money in high-yield returns if you haven’t got it to invest. There’s no money. They ran out years ago, and have been borrowing like mad to cover the gap, and are now about to run out of people willing to lend it to them.

They’re cutting welfare and public health, too. If you don’t cut science, then you have to cut everything else even more.

As Tuc said, if you want it to go on, you are welcome to try to fund it yourselves; to borrow the money to pay for it. The logic is the same – if it’s worth funding via tax, then it would be worth funding via charity. Or you could look at it the other way around, and suggest that scientists and engineers from now on will work for free, for the sake of science. How much do you believe in it?

It’s a relief, though, to know that other nations are willing to take on our top scientists and continue to fund it. Bad news for the UK, but good news for science, and humanity in general.

British scientists have achieved a huge amount with extremely low levels of funding. To cut back further now is simply madness. As one friend of mine put it, “it’s like trying to lose weight by blowing your own brains out.”