Cancer Research Budget 2017:
Or, How I Learned to Quit Worrying About Cancer And Love the Bomb
By Jakob D. Jensen, Ph.D.
2017 Federal Budget by Agency (in Billions of Dollars)
National Cancer Institute
We don’t spend much $$$ here
5.894
National Science Foundation
8
EPA
8.24
Dept of Commerce
9.75
Dept of Labor
12.8
Social Security Administration
13.23
Dept of the Interior
13.4
Dept of the Treasury
15.6
NASA
19
Dept of Agriculture
24.6
Dept of Justice
29
Dept of Energy
32.5
Dept of Homeland Security
40.6
Dept of Housing & Urban Development
48.9
Dept of State
50.1
National Intelligence Program
53.5
Dept of Education
We spend lots of $$$ here
69.4
Dept of Veteran Affairs
78.7
Dept of Health & Human Services
82.8
Dept of Transportation
98.1
Dept of Defense
583
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
Click here to see an overview of the 2017 budget
2014 Deaths in the U.S.
Domestic Terrorism
8
13
We talk a lot about these, but . . .
Guns
Number of days it takes cancer
to surpass deaths from
domestic terrorism and gun
violence combined.
12562
Cancer
585,720
0
100,000 200,000 300,000 400,000 500,000 600,000 700,000
6,900
Funding for Cancer Research vs. Nuclear
Weapons (in Billions of Dollars)
Number of Nuclear Warheads
the U.S. has stockpiled.
100
Number of Nuclear warheads it
takes to destroy life on Earth.
19
20
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
9.2
5.894
National Cancer Institute
Maintain Nuclear Weapons
Stockpile
Develop Modern Nuclear
Weaponry
If we stopped making new weapons and destroyed 6,800
warheads we already have, then we could still destroy the world (if
we needed to) and increase our cancer research budget by 500%.
7.1 billion
Put differently, cancer researchers
have less funding than the border
patrol, railroad, and the IRS. What
is your perception of the efficacy of
those organizations?
Border Patrol Budget
Consider:
Our border is safer than your body.
7 billion
5.894 billion
National Cancer Institute Budget
Railroad Operations & Research
Cancer research infrastructure:
Less $ than the U.S. railroad system.
Moreover, cancer researchers have
roughly the same funding as the
TSA.
11.8 billion
Internal Revenue Service Budget
Taxed to death isn’t a literal threat.
5.1 billion
Transportation Security
Administration Budget
Did they find that shaving cream in your bag?
10.1 billion
Budget for F-35 aircrafts in 2017.
Cancer Moonshot to the Rescue?
In recognition that cancer research needed
more funding, the White House decided to
“eliminate cancer as we know it” by adding . . .
1 billion
We spend 6.1 billion a year
cleaning up nuclear waste
created by nuclear weapons
development.
. . . to the budget. It’s a wonderful start,
but hopefully you now see how little that
is relative to the problem. We need to
spend more $ on cancer research.
As a reminder: The F-35 is the “most expensive
plane in history” yet it “simply doesn’t work.”
American taxpayers will pay 1 trillion for the
development of the F-35 from beginning to end.
The equivalent of our cancer research budget for
the next 166 years. More than 97 million
Americans will die of cancer during that span.
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