News Release: FY 2008 Budget for BEA Supports Initiative for Measuring the Impact of R&D on the Economy

Available for this Release: Release: PDF (23 KB), Budget Fact Sheet (76 KB)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, February 5, 2006

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The budget President Bush submitted today to Congress contains a request for funds that will allow the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) to measure the impact research and development has on the Nation’s economy. The President’s request of $81.4 million for BEA for fiscal year 2008 includes $2.1 million for an initiative being closely followed in economic and business circles to incorporate R&D as investment into the National Income and Product Accounts (NIPAs), or the gross domestic product (GDP).

On September 28, 2006, BEA and the National Science Foundation (NSF) released a preliminary R&D satellite account, which provided prototype estimates of the effects of treating R&D as investment in GDP rather than as an expense. These preliminary findings were the first glimpse of the effect that R&D and other knowledge-based activities have on the U.S. economy. Many economists have argued that these knowledge-based activities should be incorporated into the NIPAs and GDP. The $2.1 million budget initiative extends this work on the preliminary R&D satellite account, funded by NSF through 2007, to prepare them for full incorporation into the GDP by 2013.

More details of the FY 2008 R&D budget initiatives are available in the attached FY 2008 Fact Sheet.

Last updated: Friday, August 08, 2008

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