Sure, but I don’t think most of the money that goes into funding math is for the purposes of pure understanding. The reason governments fund mathematics research grants is generally for a more instrumental purpose; taking the US congress as an example, the mission of the NSF is to, “Promote the progress of science; advance national health, prosperity, and welfare; and secure national defense.” Most federal math grants come from the NSF.

Of course, math research is cheap and most academics don’t rely upon grants, their salary covers most of their expenses. But here too, the mathematics professor spends a substantial amount of their time teaching future engineers/quants/other applied mathematicians, who need to understand math for instrumental purposes, not as an end in and of itself. Without the tuitions of these students, I can’t imagine universities maintaining the size of their math departments, let alone expanding them as Dr. Sahai advocates for.

So who or what funds the community of pure mathematics going forward?