NASAs Insufficient Budget

By Dragomir Dzhorov

NASAs budget is not what it needs to be. NASAs projects and missions are
drastically slowed down by the low budget it receives from the government. In order for
NASA to make progress at a decent pace, the budget needs some improvement. If the
budget stays the same, NASA would still be able to make progress, although it would be
drastically slower. If NASAs missions and projects did not benefit mankind, it would
not be such a big deal. Since the research and exploration that NASA does greatly
benefits almost everyone on Earth to some extent, it is important that this research is
carried out faster so people can benefit from it. A project that would take NASA five
years to develop could easily take two if there was enough money at their disposal.
NASA formally announced that President Obama proposed $18.5 billion
dollars for NASA to pursue space missions and collect information about space and the
Earth, as of 2015. The budget is decided through a long and complicated system which
goes through many different people until it is finally decided. This process begins with
the president of the united states, along with NASA itself, proposing the budget to
congress, after which congress can accept, deny or alter the sum. That sum is subject to
change as needs arise in other parts of the government. The budget is decided over a
period of about four seasons in which it undergoes many stages before the final amount is
officially announced. The process starts with NASAs Chief Financial Officer has the
head of each NASA center compile their requests for the next budget. A couple of

months later that information is compiled after which NASAs directorates work on
making sure the requested sum is in line with NASAs priorities. This is where the
presidents request comes in. The president suggests the budget for the long term and
that gets taken into consideration based on the current requested budget. The presidents
suggestion, while taken seriously, is highly subject to change. Once those steps are
complete, the budget is sent to OMB which insures that the budget aligns with the
president's policies and goals. OMB then sends the budget back to NASA with
information on changes. Once the budget has been altered to fit the presidents goals the
budget is officially decided and published. There are many people that have a direct say
in NASAs budget, and they might not agree that funding NASA is important. NASAs
space exploration suffers as a result. These people need better better communication,
through meetings for example, in order to make better decisions about the budget.
The reason that the current budget is not enough has to do with the current
projects. NASA receives just over the amount necessary to keep current machinery
operational. When it comes time to start a new project NASA has already spent the
majority of the budget on keeping satellites and rovers working, and there is little to no
money left to start new projects. The current amount of money set aside for human space
exploration is about eight billion dollars, which is nothing considering just putting a
person in orbit around the Earth costs one hundred thousand dollars. Putting someone on
mars would cost way more than eight billion dollars thus taking many years to
accomplish. It took one hundred billion dollars to land people on the moon and that was
accomplished in two years, whereas now NASA is planning to land on mars sometime

around 2030. That is fourteen years in the future. That time frame is significant because,
many things can change in fourteen years. At the rate technology is developing NASA
could start a project and by the time it is complete the technology they used at the start
could already be outdated. There is some progress in the budget; according to Ken
Kremer, As part of the omnibus bill, NASAs approved budget amounts to nearly
$19.3 Billion. This is a step in the right direction. This is an increase of just under one
billion dollars. If the government decides to increase NASAs funding, it will not happen
very fast. The budget does not need to increase very fast. It could be increased slowly
over time, not all at once. With a higher budget, perhaps not as much as back in the day,
NASA could get to mars twice as fast. This would eliminate that problem. The people
working at NASA are eager to explore space; they are, however, held back by the
funding they receive. Money is the limiting factor, the more funding NASA receives the
faster new projects will be developed.
NASA currently has many ongoing projects that the majority of the budget goes
towards. Some examples are: the Hubble space telescope, Cassini, and the Curiosity
rover. These huge projects may have cost millions, and sometimes billions, but if you
divide that money out to the entire population of the Unites States it is around one dollar
per person per year, for each individual project. Only fifty cents per person could sustain
the curiosity rover for an entire year. That , however, is for individual projects, not the
entire budget. When the entire budget is put into consideration, that price skyrockets.
There are many ways to approach this problem. For a regular person eighteen and a half
billion dollars may seem like a lot, but on a country level that is not as much. To put the

budget into perspective, if everyone in the United States gave up fifty seven dollars, that
would match the current budget for NASA. Raising the amount per person by just twenty
dollars would increase the budget by a significant amount. That amount is roughly
twenty-four and a half billion. With an extra six billion dollars, NASA could potentially
fund two separate projects. This may not be the best solution but it is one of many
solutions that could be used to increase NASAs funding. Making sacrifices as a country
for the greater good is necessary for the future development of mankind.
Many people would say that there are more important things that the government
could spend their time and money on instead of NASA. Those specific people are not
looking at the big picture. Ron Garan, an astronaut and pilot, is frequently asked,
Why should we spend money on space exploration when we have so many problems
here on Earth? While it is true that some problems require the governments help,
funding NASA could indirectly benefit many people. For example NASAs Apollo
missions are what inspired the invention of solar panels and personal computers, among
other things. These inventions have improved many peoples lives around the world.
Through computers scientists were able to collect and compile enormous amounts of data
about the way the environment works, which has saved many people from being victims
of hurricanes and other natural disasters, and that is only a small fraction of the benefits
of computers. Solar panels have helped reduce some greenhouse gasses in the
atmosphere by replacing fossil fuel based power generation. Along with that solar panels
have been used to power refrigeration units. According to Ron Garan,This system
eliminates reliance on an electric grid, requires no batteries, stores thermal energy

for efficient use when sunlight is absent, and works anywhere in the world.
Doctors can use these refrigeration units to store vaccines and medicines in parts of the
world where it was not previously possible or it cost large amounts of money. This is an
important resource for developing countries that do not have readily available electricity.
People who previously had no access to vaccines in certain regions of Africa are now
able to be vaccinated due to these refrigerators, which were possible due to NASAs
space missions. These inventions do not necessarily improve specific peoples lives, they
improve Earths entire population as a whole. Without the need for solar panels in space,
solar panels might not have been invented until much later. Considering the fact that
fossil fuels are much cheaper than solar panels, solar panels might not have been invented
at all if it was not for NASA. If NASA eventually does send astronauts to mars, that
could give rise to many new technologies that benefit people all over the world. For
example missions to mars could develop new, faster forms of travel, which could benefit
everyone across the globe through advancements in global trade. Faster transportation of
goods means that many people could have access to food, which they previously did not.
Other advancements in trade could lower the prices of shipments, which would make
goods cheaper for consumers.
There are many great benefits for every person on Earth that could come as a
result of NASAs space missions. NASA just needs a boost in funding for all of those
great benefits to be achieved faster. NASA could reach its goals at a fraction of the time
it normally would if the government gave it a simple boost in funding, and with that
plenty of great inventions will be developed faster for the publics greater good.