IN-DEPTH: Feds spend $16 billion in research funding over decade — half locked behind paywalls

CALGARY — University libraries spend hundreds of millions of dollars to access the latest insights into science, health, and the arts — all funded by taxpayers, yet the research is not publicly accessible.Not only that, but Canadian university libraries pay millions a year to access up-to-date research published in private academic journals.How are taxpayers funding this knowledge?Through federal grants.."On a basic level, this is taxpayers' money that is being extracted from the higher education system," Philippe Mongeon, associate professor of information management at Dalhousie University in Halifax, told CBC News about the fees Canadian universities pay.As a consequence of paying for academic journal access, fewer taxpayer dollars are going toward further research. "There are less resources for research and social programs, as the publishers are extracting it. And that makes it harder to solve societal problems, to improve the lives of Canadians," Mongeon stated. University Affairs reported, since 2016, the feds have given Canadian research institutions $16 billion in research grants..Although the feds, and therefore taxpayers, pay for this research, the subsequent information "paradoxically, [is] hidden from the public behind a paywall."The money is allocated across research institutions, including the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Although universities still have to pay journals to access a significant amount of research, open-access journals also exist.Under this format, researchers or their institutions make payments to journals to publish articles, often in an open-access format.These fees can cost up to $10,000 USD, and are usually paid through research grants. .Hypothetically speaking, this in turn allows for open access within a year of publication for all who wish to read the research.However, there are not currently any penalties for Canadian scholars who do not comply with open access rules, and there is no way to monitor them.Since 2018, Canada has been responsible for 3.6% of the world's research publications, ranking ninth globally for its research output, according to a 2025 report by the Council of Canadian Academies. According to MDPI Blog, in January 2026 only roughly half of Canada's articles are open access..That leaves quite a few articles being blocked by paywalls that universities have to pay for — not to mention the public, which does not get access unless it pays the piper.To get an idea of how much one has to pay for one journal alone annually, for Elsevier — widely considered the world's largest and most profitable scientific, technical, and medical publisher — their Canadian Journal of Diabetes subscription is $1,262 USD annually. For reference, Elsevier has hundreds of journals up for subscription. According to the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN), 88 Canadian universities, libraries, and research centres spent $157 million to access journals written through public funding in 2025..As John Nguyen, a PhD student at McGill University, and Maryam Tabrizian, professor of biomedical engineering at McGill reports in University Affairs, despite attempts at open access, many academics view it as second-class.The reason?They have to use their scarce resources to pay up to $10,000 USD to publish their work. Both Nguyen and Tabrizian claim a way to boost publicly accessible, publicly funded research is to mandate open access rules and get the feds to spend more money to "cover the ever-increasing article processing charges associated with many open-access publishers, in addition to the typical expenses incurred during the course of research.".However, there are ways for the feds and researchers to save money (without spending more) — by making sure the allocation of research grants goes to worthwhile studies.Though Canada has not reported anything similar, it is safe to assume it mirrors the US in many respects.This (probably) includes the fact many studies are being dedicated to DEI research.According to the US Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz's 2024 investigative report, 3,400 grants, totalling more than $2.05 billion USD in federal funding awarded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) were going to DEI projects..As Adam Mastroianni, an American experimental psychologist wrote on his Substack, "Whenever people complain that a lot of government-funded science ends up un-cited and unused, or that it’s hideously ideological or pointlessly incremental, I gotta laugh because those are the projects we picked.""We got exactly what we asked for; it’s like ordering something from Amazon and then being angry when it arrives. The problem isn’t the product — it’s the picking."As Mastroianni suggests, grants should be given selectively, so the feds can ultimately save taxpayer money."Public funding should go to projects that are foundational, speculative, long-term, useful but unsexy, or big if true," stated Mastroianni.."We should be placing some of our bets outside the scientific consensus so that we don’t waste billions on one idea that turns out to be wrong."This, Mastroianni says, is how to save money in research: be selective and measure for their discovery value, which will reduce costs — which can help cover open access fees. "If we tracked them long term—not 'did this get into a good journal,' but 'did this end up mattering'—we could figure out which ones work better for what ends, and we could get more science for less money," stated Mastroianni.

IN-DEPTH: Feds spend $16 billion in research funding over decade — half locked behind paywalls

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