President’s FY20 Budget Proposal Follows Past Proposals with Few Exceptions

President Donald Trump’s FY20 budget request was released in March. The request is similar to past requests of this administration, proposing large cuts for the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, and Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and modest cuts for many federal statistical agencies. However, there are a few notable exceptions.

The administration requests an 88% increase for the US Census Bureau, a 7% increase for the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), and a 12% increase for the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). The Census Project commented the FY20 is $1 billion short of what Secretary Wilbur Ross said he would need.

The 7% increase for the BEA would be used for its agency’s work to implement the Foundations of Evidence-Based Policymaking Act (FEPA), provide GDP information to Puerto Rico, and plan the proposed Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) move to the Department of Commerce.

The BJS request would restore BJS to its F18 level after a 10% cut in FY19.

USDA again proposes to slash the Economic Research Service program budget, this time by 48%, through cuts to research and analysis for the following areas:

  1. Farm, conservation, and trade policy
  2. Food assistance, nutrition, and diet quality
  3. Rural economy and well-being
  4. Food safety

The FY20 request also supports the Federal Data Strategy and implementation of FEPA. To this point, ASA member Nick Hart penned the following piece for Roll Call from his position with the Bipartisan Policy Center: “Yes, Trump’s Budget Really Does Promote Evidence-Based Policies.”

The FY20 budget request also advances the Trump administration’s proposal announced last year to move the BLS to the Department of Commerce to be more closely aligned with the other two federal economic statistical agencies—Census and BEA.

For more information and to follow FY20 budget developments, see FY20 NIH, NSF, AHRQ, NIFA,& FDA Budget Developments and FY20 Statistical Agency Budget Developments.