troducing any new product may become 

 prohibitive for all but the very largest companies. 

 The effect can then lead to elimination of long- 

 range research since no pay-out can be an- 

 ticipated. 



B.L. Williams, Director of Corporate Research 

 at Monsanto, was more concerned about con- 

 sistency of regulations. One of the problems he 

 listed is "The inconsistency of government 

 regulatory actions or proposed actions." 



It is not the regulations themselves or the threat of 

 regulatory action, onerous as they might be, but 

 the unpredictability of such action. The unpredic- 

 tability tends to push deployment of resources 

 toward fighting real or possible "fires." Fire 

 fighting might require basic research, but it is not 

 likely to be predominantly long range. This is 

 particularly true in product and end-use regula- 

 tion, as well as what basic raw materials will be 

 economically preferred in the 1980's. These 

 concerns require generation of more options 

 than in the past for defensive purposes. 



Of all the consequences of overregulation, one 

 of the most serious, according to the industry 

 letters, is that research resources are diverted 

 from basic research to "defensive" research, i.e., 

 research designed to insure compliance with the 

 regulations. This is clearly the opinion of Lee A. 

 Iacocca, President of the Ford Motor Company: 



Long-range research on problems of concern to 

 major U.S. industries is essential to the 

 maintenance of a technological base that will 

 permit the U.S. to remain competitive in the world 

 economy. Although part of the drastic decline in 

 industrial support for such research is a result of 

 the depressed economy, another serious cause is 

 the need for industry to commit a substantial and 

 increasing proportion of its research resources in 

 response to regulatory demands and goals 

 established by the Congress and a number of 

 federal agencies. Research is needed to develop 

 sound technical solutions to environmental and 

 safety problems, but some present and proposed 

 regulation is excessive, and research to meet 

 such goals wastes scarce research resources. In 

 these cases, resources could far better be spent 

 on long-range research that will provide im- 

 proved products or processes. 



The same point is made by Herbert E. 

 Hirschland, Vice President for Technology and 

 Development of the American Can Company: 



Fundamental (long term, basic) research has 

 classically been a small percentage of total 

 industry research. Nevertheless, it has been 

 important and there are certainly many examples 

 well known to all scientists. Industry has been 

 more concerned with applied or developmental 

 research, again for reasons well known to the 

 scientific community. Our fears are that the last 

 vestiges of industry's fundamental research, as 

 well as the related efforts in applied research, will 

 take a back seat to research related to com- 

 pliance. While we must be careful not to portray 

 an image of being anti-environment, anti- 

 pollution, anti-consumer, anti-general societal 

 benefits, the cost of R&D associated with 

 government regulations, as well as the cost of 

 coping with all of the requirements, per se, is 

 increasing dramatically. 



In the view of Richard A. Greenberg, Vice 

 President for Research and Development at 

 Swift & Company, this deflection of productive 

 research funds into "defensive" research 

 depends closely on the public's attitude toward 

 science and technology. He felt that both 

 Federal regulatory agencies and the Congress 

 are acting defensively because of public 

 pressure. As a result, their actions are im- 

 peding, rather than promoting, technical ad- 

 vance. The situation, in his view, has reached 

 crisis proportions, and must be reversed. The 

 National Science Foundation must spearhead a 

 program to inform the public of the "virtues" of 

 technological advance, in order at least to put its 

 potential negative aspects into perspective. 



There is one aspect of the overregulation issue 

 that is peculiar to industry. A fair number of 

 letters expressed concern about Federal patent 

 policy and antitrust legislation, maintaining 

 that these are hindrances to research. ]. H. 

 Gross, Director of Research at the United States 

 Steel Corporation, expressed this view: 



Present patent laws are not particularly generous 

 when one considers the length of time required to 

 bring a new technology to useful status. Rather 

 than improve exploitation of patent rights, 



64 



FREEDOM IN THE RESEARCH SYSTEM 



