While I understand that people have their problems with universities tuition and loans ..etc. The problem is here is that funding for basic and applied science on all front is being cut. It does provide a lot of jobs and supports a lot of universities operations too. Universities build labs which does provide infrastructure (buildings and other facilities) and NSF, NIH and DOE provide funds to use these facilities to pursue research. So these agencies have dependency on universities to provide these research facilities and manage hiring and compliance with rules.
Now there are many problems with current system which need to be addressed. But you don't solve the cancer in the cells by killing cells and thus killing patient. But you use targeted approach to the problem. This needs some modifications to the rules and deep changes in laws that will require further study and discussion. This is of course not going to happen currently.
Now some people argue that the budget is a problem and debt and deficit is more important. But again lets talk data. The whole NSF and NIH budget is less than $60B dollars in 2024 which amounts to a little bit less than 1% of the total budget. If you compare it with other Items in the budget percentage wise you will get (DoD - 7.5%), (Medicare - 6.7%), (Social Security - 4.6%), (Medicaid - 10%),(National Debt Interest - 15%). So even cutting it all will not achieve any significant improvement while create a lot of problems. There are a significant part of economy and jobs are supported by these money. The return on investment is positive in most cases and you are leading in innovation and most of scientific frontier. One can argue that these two items are very cheap to maintain you dominance than another couple of air craft carriers (and their operation costs).
If you tried and achieved any reduction in the big items in the federal budget you will be saving something near the total budget of NIH and NSF. But again for some reason a lot of focus on these programs while less focus on big items for some reason.
Now there are many problems with current system which need to be addressed. But you don't solve the cancer in the cells by killing cells and thus killing patient. But you use targeted approach to the problem. This needs some modifications to the rules and deep changes in laws that will require further study and discussion. This is of course not going to happen currently.
Now some people argue that the budget is a problem and debt and deficit is more important. But again lets talk data. The whole NSF and NIH budget is less than $60B dollars in 2024 which amounts to a little bit less than 1% of the total budget. If you compare it with other Items in the budget percentage wise you will get (DoD - 7.5%), (Medicare - 6.7%), (Social Security - 4.6%), (Medicaid - 10%),(National Debt Interest - 15%). So even cutting it all will not achieve any significant improvement while create a lot of problems. There are a significant part of economy and jobs are supported by these money. The return on investment is positive in most cases and you are leading in innovation and most of scientific frontier. One can argue that these two items are very cheap to maintain you dominance than another couple of air craft carriers (and their operation costs).
If you tried and achieved any reduction in the big items in the federal budget you will be saving something near the total budget of NIH and NSF. But again for some reason a lot of focus on these programs while less focus on big items for some reason.