Quartiles

Findings

• Federal R&D obligations have increased appreciably from about $68 billion in 1997 to about $111 billion in 2007, an increase of 63% in current dollars.
• In 2007, federal R&D obligations per civilian worker were concentrated in a few states; only 12 states and the District of Columbia exceeded the national average of $764 per worker.
• Federal R&D obligations in 2007 varied greatly among the states, ranging from $4,029 to $115 per civilian worker. Higher values were found in the states surrounding the District of Columbia and in sparsely populated states with national laboratories or federal facilities.
• EPSCoR states tended to be concentrated in the lower two quartiles of this indicator, showing that many EPSCoR states receive smaller amounts of federal R&D funding than would have been anticipated based on the size of their civilian workforce.

Description

This indicator shows how federal R&D funding is disbursed geographically relative to the size of a state's civilian workforce. Federal R&D dollars are attributed to the states in which the recipients are located.

Federal obligations for R&D come from the National Science Foundation Survey of Federal Funds for Research and Development and include data reported by 11 federal agencies. The Department of Defense (DOD) disburses most—approximately 50%—federal R&D funding. The geographic distribution of DOD development funding to industry reflects the location of prime contractors only, not the subcontractors who perform much of the R&D. A high value may indicate the existence of a number of large prime contractors or major federally funded R&D facilities in a state.

The size of a state's civilian workforce is a nonseasonally adjusted annual estimate of employed workers based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Population Survey, which assigns workers to a location based on residence. Estimates for states with smaller populations are generally less precise than estimates for states with larger populations.

Data Table