GOP Senators: Don’t Show The Public The Money

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is trying to reduce the level of silica dust that workers are exposed to.  When they proposed doing so, they asked for scientific research but (quite reasonably) asked for researchers to disclose where they got their funding from.  This was not so popular:

But now, in a dizzying turnabout of standard thinking about scientific integrity, a group of 16 Senate Republicans has complained of OSHA’s request for funding disclosure. Leading them was Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), ranking minority member of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. . .

In effect, the GOP senators are arguing that the funding for any research submitted for the record in a regulatory proceeding should always be undisclosed. If an industry group may have changed the findings of the scientific research to suit their economic interests, the senators seem to be arguing, that possibility should be kept secret as well. Moreover, the senators seem to believe that lobbyists and consultants who are paid by industry to submit comments to the record in rulemakings should never reveal who hired them to submit those comments.

It is pretty obvious what the Republican Senators are afraid of.  A requirement to show who is paying for the science supporting conservative causes will show that it is largely industry-funded.  And that will lead people to realize that the studies may not be objective.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.