what a fucking Friday afternoon news dump: they are capping indirects at 15% grants.nih.gov/grants/guide... - ThreadSky | a Reddit-style client for Bluesky

needhibhalla.bsky.social • 21 days ago

what a fucking Friday afternoon news dump: they are capping indirects at 15%

https://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-25-068.html

Comments

sarahhengel.bsky.social•21 days ago

😳

merz.bsky.social•21 days ago

They're trying to.

ckean02.bsky.social•21 days ago

I looked away for two hours.

pierrette1789.bsky.social•21 days ago

Please spell this out, for those of us who don’t know the vocabulary around grants.🤔

What are “indirects”, and what is the expected effect of this guidance?

ehaswell.bsky.social•21 days ago

Federal grants come with money for supplies and salaries for the laboratory, AND with money for the institution that hosts the lab. Typically 50% or more of the grant goes to the institution. So a grant that gives the lab $500,000 will give the university $250,000. Now that will be 15% or $75,000.

geoshanz.bsky.social•21 days ago

As a civil servant, I haven’t run my own lab in academia… I can speak contract, but not this type of funding… Does this imply the remaining funding (I’m assuming “direct”) will need to make up for the loss?

geoshanz.bsky.social•21 days ago

Or rather the “difference”? (“Loss” might not be the appropriate term?)

haneberg.bsky.social•21 days ago

Technically, it can’t. There are limits on what direct vs indirect can cover…that’s the reason they’re treated separately.

pierrette1789.bsky.social•21 days ago

This is making sense to me now.

I worked on a project with a govt contract once, and it stipulated what % had to be spent directly by the contracting firm, as opposed to what % could be sub-contracted to another entity.

We gamed the heck out of that. 😏

cohenlab.bsky.social•21 days ago

This is horrific

luskinglab.bsky.social•21 days ago

😱

wharryman.bsky.social•21 days ago

for those asking, indirect costs are around 50-60% of the grant total (the direct costs) that goes back to the host institution to support research overhead like buildings, electricity, and staff, etc - direct costs are those applied directly to the research the grant supports, including students

lmc55g95.bsky.social•21 days ago

Thank you.

skibidimckoozyak.bsky.social•21 days ago

Point of clarification. We apply our rates to a Modified Total Direct Cost base to calculate the amount of indirect costs to be reimbursed by federal science agencies. If your rate is about 60%, that’s about 30 percent of Total Costs. Here is an explainer I developed: https://www.ucop.edu/research-policy-analysis-coordination/policies-guidance/indirect-cost-recovery/calculating-IDC-recovery.html

wharryman.bsky.social•21 days ago

Thanks for clarifying!

peterlorenz.bsky.social•21 days ago

Good context.

matthartings.bsky.social•21 days ago

Hooooooo .... 👀

millerlab.bsky.social•21 days ago

What a fucking kick in the gut. Fuck

nmrkaygee.bsky.social•21 days ago

"dump" is a particularly well-chosen word, yes

j-lastcoolletter.bsky.social•21 days ago

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, yes it's totally awful. On the other hand MAYBE MY COLLEAGUES WHO HAVE BEEN SHRUGGING AND SAYING "oh well wachagonnado" WILL WAKE THE FUCK UP FINALLY.

And if you're funded by DOD, NASA, DOEnergy, NIST, don't think they won't do this to you.

andrewhardaway.bsky.social•21 days ago

Yep. This was a news dump.

eyegah.bsky.social•21 days ago

I feel very dumb for asking this, but can someone explain to a non-scientist what this means?

jsauce7.bsky.social•21 days ago

They are cutting off the $ needed for infrastructure and staff that are needed to support research. Buildings, safety, animal/human ethics, equipment, ...

itsmanishgoel.bsky.social•21 days ago

My initial thought (as non american) is that 15% for administration and 85% for direct project related expenses seems to be a good ratio, but I assume I am missing something. I would be happy to know more.

jsauce7.bsky.social•21 days ago

The federal government negotiates with each university for the indirects rate needed to support the research, backed by a lot of data. 60-70% is typical, certified by govt as necessary.

jsauce7.bsky.social•21 days ago

You can't do the research project without first paying the mortgage, utilities, and a staff that ensure proper finance, adherence to ethical treatment of humans and animals, submitting grants and progress reports, shared scientific facilities, etc.

itsmanishgoel.bsky.social•21 days ago

Is it the case that these indirect rates are the major source of funding for the institutions? I would have assumed that they receive separate funding by the government for maintaining the facility which then also controls administrative costs.

eyegah.bsky.social•21 days ago

Thanks, having the usual rate does help me define the scope.

needhibhalla.bsky.social•21 days ago

when we get a grant we get two pots of money: direct costs that directly fund the research (supplies and stipends for trainees) and indirects, that provide funds for the institution to support the research (electricity for equipment, staff to administer the grants, space for the research, etc.).

needhibhalla.bsky.social•21 days ago

By capping indirects, this administration is essentially hobbling the ability of institutions to support scientists. For example, my institution gets 55 cents in indirects for every dollar in direct costs to make sure I have space and utilities to do research.

needhibhalla.bsky.social•21 days ago

Oh and sorry, you're not dumb! It's just very specific details about how research works at universities and research institutions. Thank you for asking!

skibidimckoozyak.bsky.social•21 days ago

NIH’s Twitter post on this was purposely misleading, implying that universities take 60 percent of every dollar of a grant for IDC. More like 30 percent of Total Costs. I’ve been shocked how really smart PIs don’t understand this. Here is a website I wrote about it: https://www.ucop.edu/research-policy-analysis-coordination/policies-guidance/indirect-cost-recovery/calculating-IDC-recovery.html

needhibhalla.bsky.social•21 days ago

I think the details of this are confusing and not super duper clear, as your link indicates. I’ve run a lab for 15 years and what costs are subject to indirects took some time for me to learn.

eyegah.bsky.social•21 days ago

Thank you for answering! I appreciate it.

lmc55g95.bsky.social•21 days ago

Yes, thank you for this easily understood explanation!

drugmonkey.bsky.social•21 days ago

Minor adjustment. The “we” here is the University. It gets the money. All of it. We, the investigators, are allowed to manage the direct costs of that money. But it’s all the institution’s money to spend.

pjenkinslab.bsky.social•21 days ago

It means universities, which are huge employers in most states, will not be able to pay the bills. It's the gutting of biomedical research in this country

eyegah.bsky.social•21 days ago

My god we’re cratering.

pjenkinslab.bsky.social•21 days ago

It's very very bad