This seems to be a consequence of financial deepening. Expressing net foreign liabilities as a percentage of the total financing in the economy is, perhaps, more relevant, since it gives some indication of the proportion of the economy’s funding that is coming from offshore. In Australia, this ratio has remained relatively steady since the late 1980s, at a little over 20 per cent.
Direct government support or conduct of the research may make the most sense if the project is highly focused and large-scale, possibly involving the need for coordination of the work of many researchers and subject to relatively tight time frames. Examples of large-scale, government-funded research include the space program and the construction and operation of “atom-smashing” facilities for experiments in high-energy physics.