🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <562@banyan.UUCP> gil@banyan.com writes:
>In article <12345@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu> wen-king@cit-vax.UUCP (Wen-King Su) writes:
>>Perhaps we could have provided more positive influences to the
>>industry, but we are operating under the guideline that university
>>research groups should not be turned into joint-ventures.  The tax-
>>payers did not give us money for us to make more money for ourselves.
>
>Why not ?  If you start off a (successfull) joint venture won't you
>end up employing people ? People who will be paying taxes on the money
>they make as well as buying goods and services etc.  It would seem
>that the "tax payers" would be much better off if a state-funded
>research group _were_ turned into a joint venture rather than to let
[ etc about benefits of start-up and Mass miracle ]

No, the problem is that the taxpayer outlay for the start up
is not compensated by the jobs "created" or the taxes received.
I put "created" in quotes, because I do not believe that all of
these jobs are created - the increased competition is going to
cost somebody something, be it another startup which goes under,
a major corp which loses some market share and lays people off,
or the reduction of a substitutive market, such as typewriter
manufacturers.  But let's not get into social dynamics - even
if the jobs are all "created", the taxpayer has footed a major
bill, the rewards of which will, for the most part, end up in
only a few people's pockets.  To address the Mass miracle, it
wasn't the concentration of major universities which brought
it about, it was the concentration of defense contractors,
which is why the carpet was pulled out from under Mass when
the defense cutbacks went through (you will recall Mass has
had deficits recently - no more miracle).

Greg Frazier
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@))))))))))))))))))##############3
"They thought to use and shame me but I win out by nature, because a true
freak cannot be made.  A true freak must be born." - Geek Love

Greg Frazier	frazier@CS.UCLA.EDU	!{ucbvax,rutgers}!ucla-cs!frazier