March 11, 2025
A POWERFUL RETURN ON INVESTMENT:
$2.56 GENERATED FOR EVERY $1 INVESTED in NIH RESEARCH
NIH Research Funding in FY2024 Drove $94.58 Billion in Economic Activity
WASHINGTON, DC — March 11, 2024 — United for Medical Research (UMR) released the 2025 update of its annual analysis of the economic impact of research funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The analysis shows that the $36.94 billion awarded to researchers in the 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia in FY2024 supported 407,782 jobs and $94.58 billion in new economic activity nationwide — or $2.56 for every $1 invested.
“There is no better investment than one that saves lives, supports local economies and drives America’s global leadership in biomedical innovation. When Congress invests strongly and consistently in the NIH, all three of those things happen,” said UMR President Caitlin Leach.
Every state benefits from NIH research funding. As NIH funding is awarded to researchers in individual states, that funding supports employment and the purchase of research-related goods, services and materials. The income generated from these jobs and purchases cycles through the economy to produce new economic activity, benefitting local businesses.
Since Fiscal Year 2015, the NIH budget has grown by more than $17 billion thanks to strong bipartisan congressional support and a commitment to making medical research a critical national priority. Over the past decade, NIH research funding has driven more than $787 billion in new economic activity and supported an average of more than 370,000 jobs a year.
“UMR is very concerned about recent actions and proposals that would result in drastic reductions in funded research, including clinical trials, and greatly diminish NIH’s effectiveness. Such moves jeopardize lives, local communities, and U.S. industries. We urge Congress and the Trump Administration to work together to ensure that America’s long-standing and highly successful biomedical innovation ecosystem, which has a strong and well-funded NIH at its center, remains the envy of the world,” said Leach.
About this data: The analysis for this report was performed by Ronald Horst, Ph.D., Inforum. Calculation of the jobs and economic activity resulting from NIH research awards in each state relies heavily on the Regional Input-Output Modeling System (RIMS) parameters maintained by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA). BEA updates the RIMS parameters annually, although the economic data used lags by two years. Additionally, BEA does a major, “benchmark,” revision to RIMS parameters every five years.
UMR’s data for FY2024 was calculated in January 2025 using the most recently published RIMS parameters at the time, which rely on economic data for calendar year 2022 and reflect benchmark revisions and significant changes from the RIMS values published over the previous five years. The data shown here for years FY2015-FY2023 was calculated using earlier versions of BEA’s RIMS parameters or approximations for those years. Given the way the RIMS parameters change over time, the data presented here for each year should be viewed as a snapshot of the economic effects of NIH funding in that year.
UMR’s analysis used the full amount of the grants awarded by NIH in FY2024, which includes both direct and indirect research costs.
Additional Resources: Graphics, state-specific resources, including lists of NIH FY24 grant recipients, and other materials are available in this TOOLKIT.
UMR is a coalition of leading research institutions, patient and health advocates and private industry seeking strong and sustainable increases in funding for the National Institutes of Health in order to save and improve lives, advance innovation and fuel the economy. Learn more at unitedformedicalresearch.org.