Science and R&D

Rob Atkinson's article in ScienceProgress about the importance of innovation for meeting the significant new challenges facing this country. The article discusses policies that the United States should adopt to promote innovation.

Rob Atkinson’s article in the July 2007 issue of the Journal of Technology Transfer arguing for the importance of the Research and Experimentation Tax credit. The article calls for several important changes to the credit: doubling its current value, modifying the Alternative Simplified Credit to become incremental, and expanding the flat credit for collaborative R&D.

American competitiveness in the innovation-driven global economy has become a subject of intense concern, with many pointing to the shortage of well-trained American scientists, technicians, engineers, and mathematicians (STEM). Amid the proliferation of policy proposals to address the problem, however, one critical component has been largely overlooked: the role of specialty math and science high schools. In a new report, ITIF argues that such schools graduate deeply knowledgeable and passionate students of science and math who are more likely to pursue these fields in college and beyond. As a result, funding the expansion of specialty science and math schools must be an important part of any solution to the STEM challenge. The report recommends taking steps to triple enrollment in math and science high schools to reach 140,000 by 2012.

With nearly three dozen new additions, the latest update of ITIF’s “Tech Policy To-Do List” provides a menu of hundreds of actionable ideas for Congress and the administration to foster innovation, growth, and progress.