84 



port, nevertheless a clue to inadequacy of research 

 activities may be obtained in a few cases from small 

 amounts or omissions in the detailed tables presented in 

 part I of this section. 



Duplication in Research Activities 



There are sometimes allegations of duplication of 

 research activities of the Federal Government. Usually, 

 however, an investigation of any particular case shows 

 that there is no exact duplication of a significant part 

 of the work of the respective agencies. There may be 

 an overlapping in subject matter so that consolidated 

 or cooperative projects might be carried on with better 

 results or at less expense than the separate investiga- 

 tions. Such cooperative arrangements would be de- 

 sirable if they could be arranged either through the 

 initiative of one of the agencies (wliich is usually diffi- 

 cult because of probable consequences if overtures are 

 rebuffed by the other agency), or tlu-ough the technical 

 intervention of a coordmating organization or advisory 

 committee. The tyjje of duplication which seems most 

 real in Federal reseai-ch activities, especially in the so- 

 cial sciences, is the duplication of requests to the same 

 respondent for similar information set up in distinctly 

 different ways, or covering different periods, or using 

 different definitions of items. A request to respondents 

 for information exactly duplicating a previous request, 

 would probably be less burdensome, though perhaps 

 not less irritating, than an inquiry that is just enough 

 diffei-ent to require a complete reworking of the same 

 basic records before replying. 



Coordinating boards or advisory committees can 

 often be of considerable aid in discovering cases of in- 

 cipient duplication and preparing the way for direct 

 cooperation between the agencies concerned. A re- 

 search advisory council might prove to be of value in 

 this respect as well as in other phases of research prob- 

 lems affecting several Government bureaus and offices. 

 Such a council could act as a clearing house of research 

 projects proposed in the different fields for which it 

 has specialists on its staff or coordinating advisory 

 committees, and would be able to make recommenda- 

 tions about consolidations, alterations, new inquiries 

 needed, priorities, etc. If such a council were to be 

 organized, its relationship to the four existing research 

 councils and the inter-agency technical boards, as well 

 as to the Bureau of the Budget, the Congress and any 

 general planning agency that may be established, 

 should be carefully considered. 



Cooperative Private and Government 

 Financing of Research 



The use of private funds by a Federal agency for 

 carrying on research work of a cooperative or service 



National Resources Committee 



nature may be illustrated by grants from the Rocke- 

 feller Foundation for research at St. Elizabeths Hos- 

 pital; the contributions from States and local fruit 

 growers' associations to aid the Weather Bureau in its 

 collection of data for fruit-frost warnings; and re- 

 ceipts of the Bureau of Agricultural Engineering from 

 local districts, canal and ditch companies, mining and 

 hydro-power companies, and even individual farmers, 

 to help finance snow surveying and forecasting irriga- 

 tion water. In the social sciences, a possible bias in the 

 results of Government research financed partly from 

 private funds may be partially guarded against by 

 publicity of such arrangements. In the natural 

 sciences and teclmology, a corresponding danger is 

 present when a Government agency makes tests, paid 

 for by private businesses or associations of producers, 

 of products connected with the agency's research work. 

 Wlienever secrecy of results is imposed on the Govern- 

 ment agency conducting such tests in order to prevent 

 consinners from knowing about adverse reports, the 

 the interests of the public are jeopardized. 



Cooperative financing in the reverse direction, that 

 is, use of Federal funds by a non -Federal agency such 

 as a private university, a State government, or a re- 

 search foundation, for carrying on cooperative re- 

 search, now exists only in a few specially authorized 

 instances such as the grants to the agricultural experi- 

 ment stations, and the aid given to approved State 

 highway and social security research programs. Re- 

 search from emergency funds, however, is largely car- 

 ried on in local works projects under the immediate 

 supervision, if not the legal direction, of non-Federal 

 agencies. 



Some of the Federal research agencies perform 

 minor services for the public on a reimbursement 

 basis; that is, compensation is received for the ex- 

 penses involved. In some of these cases under present 

 procedure, such minor receipts are covered into the 

 general funds of the Treasury as "reimbursements", 

 "sales of products", and "sales and services", under 

 "miscellaneous revenues"; wlaile expenses for services 

 must be paid out of the agency's appropriation for 

 its own regular work. This arrangement may result 

 in a hardship to the extent that such services are per- 

 formed. Similar receipts in other agencies have been 

 set up as a special fund for which expenditures for the 

 same purposes may be made in the ftiture under usual 

 budgetary procedure for "earmarked" funds. Uni- 

 formity of treatment in such cases, if feasible, might 

 remove a source of minor annoyance and increase the 

 willingness and efficiency of some research agencies in 

 making their incidental services more widely available. 



The possibilities for using cooperative Federal-State 

 or Federal-private-institution arrangements for re- 



