🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <3panpc$c1@kocrsv08.delcoelect.com>,
rex i beard <c2xrib@kocrsv01.delcoelect.com> wrote:
>In article <LFLekx.0212@Booster.Tor.HookUp.NET>,
>Len Lekx <LFLekx@Booster.Tor.HookUp.NET> wrote:
>>In article <3p0cht$sil@kocrsv08.delcoelect.com> c2xrib@kocrsv01.delcoelect.com (rex i beard) writes:
>
>>    There is a difference.  What NASA provides - in the knowledge it
>>obtains, and
>>devices developed - can be transferred to other sectors, which can then use the
>>information to provide saleable articles to the marketplace... thus bringing
>>money _into_ the loop.
>
>Granted. But does it produce more than it consumes? We do not know. We *do*
>know that private industry did not create NASA. And we know that private
>industry is driven by the profit motive. Profit is a signal that means
>you are producing more than you are consuming. Private enterprise
>doesn't think that there is a profit in what NASA does. Hence the market
>has decided that it consumes more than it produces.

The space industry requires a huge initial investment.  Most companies are
satisfied to pay by the shot rather than build their own rockets.  Someone
has to put those satellites up.

>
>>    The warm fuzzy you get from giving money to others is not transferrable,
>>and returns nothing.
>
>But it doesn't really consume anything does it? The $100 I give to another
>person can still be used by the other person. (But this other person may
>decide not to *produce* anything because they no longer need to.)
>
>With NASA resources *are* consumed. All the hours people work and all
>the materials used are resources that are consumed.
>
><spending 600 billion on NASA would mean a larger NASA work force and a
>smaller private sector workforce.>

No.  It would mean a larger NASA work force and a larger private sector
workforce to support it.  NASA contracts out a lot of it's work to private
aerospace firms like MacDonnell-Douglas, Spar, etc.  Someone has got to
supply them with tools, raw materials, computers, etc.

>
>>> But that new person has to come from somewhere else. This is *not* good for
>>
>>    But it is - since that person is MAKING money, not TAKING it.
>
>But are they producing something more valuable than what they *use*
>to be producing? Remember, they can't do both.

Ahhh, but others can step in to take over their previous jobs.  Remember we
do have around 11% unemployment.  

<deletia>
>>> Sure there might be jobs and there might be work, but there wouldn't
>>> be any *CARS*. People would be working but they wouldn't be producing
>>> the goods and services that other folks *want*.
>>
>>    This is a silly argument - of course there would be cars.  Heck, you might
>
>How! Without the 100 people on my floor of this building GM couldn't
>build cars. If all these people worked for NASA they wouldn't work
>for Delco.
>

Yeah, you'll have real problems filling all those empty spaces.  I can't 
think of anyone who'd want to work in a nice unionized workplace and getting
$xx.xx/hr.
:))))) for the humour impaired.

>>even get an IMPROVED car... one that burns hydrogen instead of gas, or one that
>>uses electricity efficiently, or is far more crash-resistant, FAR earlier
>>than if we simply waited for the auto-makers to develop them.
>
>But you HAVE to wait for auto-makers to build them. That's what "auto-maker"
>means - people who build autos.
>
>If they all work for NASA nobody is LEFT to be an automaker! They are
>all spaceship-makers.

This is just plain silly.

<deletia>
>>> But there wouldn't be anybody *LEFT* to apply the knowledge to make
>>> the existing products better OR to *build* them.
>>
>>    You MUST be kidding!  Out of a global population of five billion,
>>we wouldn't have people to do earthbound activities?  Get real.
>
>So the U.S can increase spending and taxes by $585 billion dollars and
>funnel it to research while the rest of the world builds better
>cars with the knowledge gained from NASA research? Because there won't
>be any American engineers left to build the better cars here. And
>a good number of the manufacturing workers won't be available to build
>those cars here even if Americans could design them.
>
>The number of humans in the country (and the world) is *FINITE*. If you
>take just *ONE* of them out then there will be fewer things produced in
>the world.

If you take *ONE* of them out, there will be *thousands* clamouring for his/
her spot.

>
>>> NASA:
>>> 1)First you can not prove that it has "payed back" more than was invested.
>>
>>    Better weather information, cheap long distance communications, TV from the
>>other side of the world?  If NASA had not provided the means, none of these
>>ends would have been realized.
>
>Just as you don't know the future you don't know what would have happened
>without NASA. You can only point to things that NASA contributed to.
>I was asking you to put a value on the contributions and then tally
>up how much NASA costs. The problem is no value was ever placed on
>those contributions. And the mechanism for assigning value, the free market,
>was not used.
>

That is the mechanism for assigning monetary value.  There are other less
tangible values which come from the space program like basic knowledge for
instance.  Perhaps this is too intangible for many small companies
today.  I am certain the future will see privately owned companies grabbing
a share of the rocketry market.

<deletia>
>>    The problem is that NASA is a government agency.  If it were left to make
>>money on its' own, it would be more responsive to the people who turn to it for
>>services.
>
>That is all I want. But that requires the government to dis-associate
>itself from NASA. Then it would most like split off into several ventures.
>Some seeking profit in launches and communications, Some seeking profit
>in research, Some in entertainment, and Some as non profits seeking
>the dreams and desires of its contributors.

There is at least one privately owned company attempting to get into the 
rocket business right now.  Of course it is run by a retired NASA engineer.

>
>-rex-
>-- 
>
>Work phone: (317) 451-0358  (8-322-0358)
>Internet:   c2xrib@kocrsv01.delcoelect.com   (Ick. It's suppose to be ahw.)


-- 
"If I get good enough at insulting anybody who questions my
bullshit ideology, I might only have to defend one untenable
piece of bullshit at a time, instead of two..."  Ted Holden Himself.
Al Scott--The Bard  Company of Dreams