OSTP: Significant Accomplishments in Science and Technology Policy

1. Improved the business environment for private sector innovation and investment.

• Cut the budget deficit for three years in a row for the first time since Harry Truman. Economic plan will reduce the budget deficit in half as a percentage of GDP, freeing up capital for private sector investment.

• Worked with industry to eliminate or reform regulation that inhibits private sector investment.

• Won Congressional approval for a 3-year extension of the R&E tax credit and a targeted capital gains reduction for investments in small business.

2. Strengthened federal support for basic research.

• Increased investment in basic research at agencies such as the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

3. Focused Federal R&D priorities on civilian technologies that spur economic growth and create high-wage jobs.

• Increased investment in the Commerce Department's Advanced Technology Program, to support cooperative, industry-led projects to develop civilian technologies, and its Manufacturing Extension Partnership, to build a nationwide network of manufacturing extension services for small firms.

• Created an industry-government Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles that aims for major breakthroughs in automotive technology and lays the foundation for U.S. leadership in the world auto industry in the 21st century.

• Worked with hundreds of representatives of the electronics industries to -set priorities for cooperative government-industry R&D that will strengthen electronics manufacturing in the U.S.

• Streamlined the process for developing cooperative research and development agreements (CRADAs) between industry and Federal laboratories.

4. Worked toward world-class education for all our children and accessible, productive lifelong training for the work force, to make the benefits of technology more available to all.

• Worked with Congress to create the School-to-Work transition program for-young people who don't choose to go directly to college.

• Established Goals 2000 standards for education.

• Created the National Service Corps for young people and improved access to college loans.

• Accelerated development of civilian technologies to increase learning productivity for children and adults.

• Encouraged the transfer of defense training technologies for civilian uses.

5. Fought for trade and export policies that support economic growth.

• Won Congressional approval of NAFTA.

• Won Congressional approval of a GATT treaty that will support freer, fairer world trade and benefit U.S. technology-based industries by eliminating trade barriers and strengthening protection of intellectual property.

• Freed up $35 billion in exports by reducing export controls on U.S. computer and telecommunications products.

6. Redirected defense R&D and procurement toward dual-use technologies, enabling DOD to draw on leading-edge, affordable commercial technologies to meet military needs while also strengthening civilian industries.

• Launched the Technology Reinvestment Project to support industry-led dual-use R&D, encourage defense and commercial firms to work together on dual-use applications, and stimulate the creation of an integrated civilian-military industrial base.

• Worked with Congress to reform procurement law, and within DAD to scrap outmoded military-unique specifications and standards, so DAD can take advantage of the best in commercial technologies.

• Initiated a major cooperative, merit-based research program that will help to stimulate U.S. private investment in new generations of flat panel displays.

7. Promoted the National Information Infrastructure.

• Developed an action agenda for the National Information Infrastructure that clarifies private- and public-sector responsibilities.

• Signed legislation that will require the transfer to the private sector of 200 megahertz of the radio frequency spectrum now used by Federal agencies, and to allow competitive bidding in granting new licenses.

• Promoted applications of the NII in areas such as education, health care, electronic commerce, environmental monitoring.

• Made the use of information technology a cornerstone of efforts to make the government work better and cost less.

• Increased investment in key NII technologies and testbeds through the High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) Initiative.

8. Developed technology strategies for environmental protection that also promote economic growth.

• Pursued a common sense approach to environmental regulation that focuses on performance standards and results, not "command and control" regulation.

• Established an Environmental Technology Initiative that will help commercialize and deploy a new generation of technologies that will protect the environment while sustaining economic growth. Developed Environmental Technology Export Strategy.

9. Re-invented the space program.

• Redesigned the space station for greater economy and efficiency, integrated Russia into the space station partnership, and won Congressional approval for the new program.

• Developed a national space transportation policy to guide Federal investments in space launch vehicles.

• Solved a decade-long problem of wasteful duplication in the government's programs for orbiting weather satellites, putting into practice recommendations of the Vice President's National Performance Review.

• Devised a cost-effective way to carry on the Landsat program thus assuring the continuity of the Landsat data base with its invaluable military, civilian, and environmental applications.

10. Re-organized Federal science and technology efforts for greater efficiency and effectiveness.

• Established a Cabinet-level National Science and Technology Council, chaired by the President, to set priorities and guide Federal R&D investments government-wide.

• Greatly increased private sector review of Federal R&D and expanded competitive, cost-shared research.

• Initiated a high level review, directed by NSTC, of the three largest Federal laboratory systems, those of DOD, DOE, and NASA; the aim is to ensure effective use of Federal R&D funding to meet evolving national needs in national security, fundamental science, industrial technologies, environmental protection, and aerospace.