In his 2012 budget, US President Barack Obama called for a 4% increase in the National Research Service Award (NRSA) postdoc stipends granted by the Bethesda, Maryland-based National Institutes of Health. The request is just the start of debate with Congress, so the gain isn't assured. In 2010, after two years without change, stipends were raised by 1% to US$37,740 for first-year postdocs — but the National Postdoctoral Association (NPA) has called for more. A National Academy of Sciences report in 2000 recommended that first-years earn $45,000. In a letter to Obama on 25 January, the NPA called stipends “unacceptably low”, noting that many US institutions use the NRSA stipend scale.