Who Bears the Growing Cost of Science at Universities?

Abstract

Scientific research has come to dominate many American universities. Even with growing external support, increasingly the costs of scientific research are being funded out of internal university funds. Our paper explains why this is occuring, presents estimates of the magnitudes of start-up cost packages being provided to scientists and engineers and then uses panel data to estimate the impact of the growing cost of science on student/faculty ratios, faculty salaries and undergraduate tuition.We find that universities whose own expenditures on research are growing the most rapidly, ceteris paribus, have had the greatest increase in student faculty ratios and, in the private sector, higher tuition increases. Thus, undergraduate students bear part of the cost of increased institutional expenditures on research.