The Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) closed on September 29, 1995. During its 23-year history, OTA provided Congressional members and committees with analyses of the scientific and technological issues that were increasingly relevant to public policy and legislative action.
OTA occupied a unique role among the Congressional information agencies. Unlike the General Accounting Office, which is primarily concerned with evaluation of ongoing programs, and the Congressional Research Service, which provides rapid information on legislative topics, OTA provided a deeper, more comprehensive, and more technical level of analysis. Through eleven Congressional sessions, OTA became a key resource for Congressional members and staff confronting technological issues in crafting public policy. Its existence brought a healthy balance to the analytical resources available to the executive and legislative branches of government.
The agency’s legacy is found in the many items of legislation it influenced and in the channels of communication its staff helped foster between legislative policymakers and members of the scientific, technical, and business communities.
The Black Vault has archived here the complete collection of reports and data issued by the OTA. Clicking on any document below will take you directly to the report, all in .pdf format. This collection holds 110,670 pages in total.
1989
- Adolescent Health Insurance Status: Analyses of Trends in Coverage and Preliminary Estimates of the Effects of an Employer Mandate and Medicaid Expansion on the Uninsured
- Advanced Vehicle/Highway Systems and Urban Traffic Problems
- Assessing Contractor Use in Superfund
- Big Dumb Boosters: A Low-Cost Space Transportation Option?
- Biological Effects of Power Frequency Electric and Magnetic Fields
- Catching Our Breath: Next Steps for Reducing Urban Ozone
- Coming Clean: Superfund Problems Can Be Solved
- Competition in Coastal Seas: An Evaluation of Foreign Maritime Activities in the 200-Mile EEZ
- The Containment of Underground Nuclear Explosions
- Copyright and Home Copying: Technology Challenges the Law
- Costs and Effectiveness of Cholesterol Screening in the Elderly
- Defining “Rural” Areas: Impact on Health Care Policy and Research
- Electric Power Wheeling and Dealing: Technological Considerations for Increasing Competition
- Enhancing the Quality of U.S. Grain for International Trade
- Facing America’s Trash: What Next for Municipal Solid Waste?
- Federal Scientific and Technical Information in an Electronic Age: Opportunities and Challenges
- Grain Quality in International Trade: A Comparison of Major U.S. Competitors
- High-Performance Computing and Networking for Science 8918.PDF
- Higher Education for Science and Engineering
- Holding the Edge: Maintaining the Defense Technology Base
- Linking for Learning: A New Course for Education
- New Developments in Biotechnology: Patenting Life-Special Report
- Oil Production in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge: The Technology and the Alaskan Oil Context
- Partnerships Under Pressure: Managing Commercial Low-Level Radioactive Waste
- Performance Standards for Secondary School Vocational Education
- Polar Prospects: A Minerals Treaty for Antarctica
- Round Trip to Orbit: Human Spaceflight Alternatives
- Rural Emergency Medical Services
- Safer Skies with TCAS: Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System-A Special Report
- Statistical Needs for a Changing U.S. Economy
- Technologies for Reducing Dioxin in the Manufacture of Bleached Wood Pulp
- Technology Transfer to the United States: The MIT-Japan Science and Technology Program
- The Use of Preventive Services by the Elderly
1988
- Advanced Materials by Design
- AIDS and Health Insurance: An OTA Survey
- Are We Cleaning Up? 10 Superfund Case Studies
- Artificial Insemination: Practice in the United States: Summary of a 1987 Survey
- Biology, Medicine, and the Bill of Rights
- Book Preservation Technologies
- Commercializing High-Temperature Superconductivity
- Copper: Technology and Competitiveness
- Criminal Justice, New Technologies, and the Constitution
- The Defense Technology Base: Introduction and Overview
- Educating Scientists and Engineers: Grade School to Grad School
- Electronic Delivery of Public Assistance Benefits: Technology Options and Policy Issues
- Elementary and Secondary Education for Science and Engineering
- Enhancing Agriculture in Africa: A Role for U.S. Development Assistance
- An Evaluation of Options for Managing Greater-Than-Class-C Low-Level Radioactive Waste
- Gearing Up for Safety: Motor Carrier Safety in a Competitive Environment
- Grassroots Development: The African Development Foundation
- Healthy Children: Investing in the Future
- How Effective Is AIDS Education?
- The Impact of AIDS on the Kaiser Permanente Medical Care Program (Northern California Region)
- Infertility: Medical and Social Choices
- Informing the Nation: Federal Information Dissemination in an Electronic Age
- Institutional Protocols for Decisions About Life-Sustaining Treatments
- Issues in Medical Waste Management
- Launch Options for the Future: A Buyer’s Guide
- Mapping Our Genes-Genome Projects: How Big? How Fast?
- Medical Testing and Health Insurance
- New Developments in Biotechnology: Field-Testing Engineered Organisms: Genetic and Ecological Issues
- New Developments in Biotechnology: U.S. Investment in Biotechnology
- Paying the Bill: Manufacturing and America’s Trade Deficit
- Pesticide Residues in Food: Technologies for Detection
- Power On! New Tools for Teaching and Learning
- The Quality of Medical Care: Information for Consumers
- Reducing Launch Operation Costs: New Technologies and Practices
- Safe Skies for Tomorrow: Aviation Safety in a Competitive Environment
- Science, Technology, and the First Amendment
- Screening for Open-Angle Glaucoma in the Elderly
- SDI: Technology, Survivability, and Software
- Seismic Verification of Nuclear Testing Treaties
- Technology and the American Economic Transition: Choices for the Future
- Urban Ozone and the Clean Air Act: Problems and Proposals for Change
- Using Desalination Technologies for Water Treatment
1987
- Aid to Developing Countries: The Technology/Ecology Fit
- The Border War on Drugs
- Commercial Newsgathering From Space
- Construction and Materials Research and Development for the Nation’s Public Works
- The Costs of AIDS and Other HIV Infections: Review of the Estimates
- Defending Secrets, Sharing Data: New Locks and Keys for Electronic Information
- Do Insects Transmit AIDS?
- The Electronic Supervisor: New Technology, New Tensions
- From Pollution to Prevention: A Progress Report on Waste Reduction
- Hospital Information Systems at the Veterans Administration
- Identifying and Regulating Carcinogens
- Integrated Renewable Resource Management for U.S. Insular Areas
- International Competition in Services: Banking, Building, Software, Know-How
- Life-Sustaining Technologies and the Elderly
- Losing a Million Minds: Confronting the Tragedy of Alzheimer’s Disease and Other Dementias
- Marine Minerals: Exploring Our New Ocean Frontier
- Neonatal Intensive Care for Low Birthweight Infants: Costs and Effectiveness
- New Developments in Biotechnology: Ownership of Human Tissues and Cells
- New Developments in Biotechnology: Public Perceptions of Biotechnology
- New Technology for NATO: Implementing Follow-On Forces Attack
- Preparing for Science and Engineering Careers: Field Level Profiles
- Science, Technology, and the Constitution
- Starpower: The U.S. and the International Quest for Fusion Energy
- State Educational Testing Practices
- Technologies for the Preservation of Prehistoric and Historic Landscapes
- Technologies for Underwater Archaeology and Maritime Preservation
- Technologies To Maintain Biological Diversity
- Technology Dependent Children: Hospital Vs. Home Care
- Technology Transfer to China
- Trade Adjustment Assistance: New Ideas for an Old Program
- Trends and Status of Computers in Schools: Use in Chapter 1 Programs and Use With Limited English Proficient Students
- U.S. Oil Production: The Effect of Low Oil Prices
- The U.S. Textile and Apparel Industry: A Revolution in Progress
- Wastes in Marine Environments
1986
- Alternatives to Animal Use in Research, Testing, and Education
- Annual Report to the Congress: Fiscal Year 1985
- Assessing Biological Diversity in the United States: Data Considerations
- Children’s Mental Health: Problems and Services
- Continuing the Commitment: Agricultural Development in the Sahel
- Effects of Federal Policies on Extracorporeal Shock Wave Lithotripsy
- Electronic Record Systems and Individual Privacy
- Federal Government Information Technology: Management, Security, and Congressional Oversight
- Grassroots Conservation of Biological Diversity in the United States
- Hearing Impairment and Elderly People
- Indian Health Care
- Intellectual Property Rights in an Age of Electronics and Information
- Marine Applications for Fuel Cell Technology
- Microelectronics Research and Development
- New Structural Materials Technologies: Opportunities for the Use of Advanced Ceramics and Composites
- Nurse Practitioners, Physician Assistants, and Certified Nurse-Midwives: A Policy Analysis
- Ocean Incineration: Its Role in Managing Hazardous Waste
- Passive Smoking in the Workplace: Selected Issues
- Payment for Physician Services: Strategies for Medicare
- Plant Closing: Advance Notice and Rapid Response
- Potential Effects of Section 3 of the Federal Coal Leasing Amendments Act of 1976
- The Regulatory Environment for Science
- Research Funding as an Investment: Can We Measure the Returns?
- A Review of U.S. Competitiveness in Agricultural Trade
- Scientific Equipment for Undergraduates: Is It Adequate?
- Serious Reduction of Hazardous Waste: for Pollution Prevention and Industrial Efficiency
- The Social Security Administration and Information Technology
- Space Stations and the Law: Selected Legal Issues
- Supercomputers: Government Plans and Policies
- Technologies for Detecting Heritable Mutations in Human Beings
- Technologies for NATO’s Follow-On Forces Attack Concept
- Technologies for Prehistoric and Historic Preservation
- Technology and Structural Unemployment: Reemploying Displaced Adults
- Technology, Public Policy, and the Changing Structure of American Agriculture
- Technology, Trade, and the U.S. Residential Construction Industry
- Trade in Services: Exports and Foreign Revenues
- Transportation of Hazardous Materials
- Transportation of Hazardous Materials: State and Local Activities
- Western Surface Mine Permitting and Reclamation
1985
- Alternative Approaches to Cargo Policy: A Supplement to an Assessment of Maritime Trade and Technology
- Annual Report to the Congress: Fiscal Year 1984
- Anti-Satellite Weapons, Countermeasures, and Arms Control
- Automation of America’s Offices, 1985-2000
- Ballistic Missile Defense Technologies
- Blood Policy and Technology
- The Cost Effectiveness of Digital Subtraction Angiography in the Diagnosis of Cerebrovascular Disease
- Demographic Trends and the Scientific and Engineering Workforce
- Displaced Homemakers: Programs and Policy
- The Effectiveness and Costs of Continuous Ambulatory Peritoneal Dialysis (CAPD)
- Electronic Surveillance and Civil Liberties
- Energy Technology Transfer to China
- Information Technology R&D: Critical Trends and Issues
- Innovative Biological Technologies for Lesser Developed Countries
- International Cooperation and Competition in Civilian Space Activities
- Managing the Nation’s Commercial High-Level Radioactive Waste
- Medical Devices and the Veterans Administration
- Medicare’s Prospective Payment System: Strategies for Evaluating Cost, Quality, and Medical Technology
- New Electric Power Technologies: Problems and Prospects for the 1990s
- Oil and Gas Technologies for the Arctic and Deepwater
- Preventing Illness and Injury in the Workplace
- R&D in the Maritime Industry: A Supplement to an Assessment of Maritime Trade and Technology
- Reproductive Health Hazards in the Workplace
- Reproductive Health Hazards in the Workplace: Selected Aspects of Reproductive Health Hazards Regulations
- Review of the Public Health Service’s Response to AIDS
- Status of Biomedical Research and Related Technology for Tropical Diseases
- Strategic Materials: Technologies To Reduce U.S. Import Vulnerability
- Superfund Strategy
- Technologies for Managing Urinary Incontinence
- Technologies To Benefit Agriculture and Wildlife
- Technology and Aging in America
- Technology, Public Policy, and the Changing Structure of American Agriculture: A Special Report for the 1985 Farm Bill
- U.S. Natural Gas Availability: Gas Supply Through the Year 2000
- U.S.-Soviet Cooperation in Space