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Re: Do aero/astro engineers die if NASA didn't exist?
Posted by Reality (more from Reality) on Tue, 24 Apr 2012 14:48:49
In Reply to: Re: Do aero/astro engineers die if NASA didn't exist?, John G, Tue, 24 Apr 2012 14:17:35
NASA accomplishes the draft in two ways:

1. Forbidding space launch by private companies in the US. So long as that ban was in place during the NASA monopoly, companies like Virgin Galactic couldn't sell their service therefore they wouldn't be able to hire much of anyone.

2. Paying engineers to work for NASA at a rate higher than what the private sector could afford to pay. It's the same as the government subsidy for megabanks turning a large cross-section of young mathematical minds to financial engineering in the last couple decades.

Proof for private companies willing to step up in the absence of the ban came in two fold:

1. Private rocketeers existed in the US before the ban. Hughes Aircraft company formed Aerospace Group in 1948. It had two parts: Space+Communication, and Space Systems. After NASA became the monopoly on space launches, the Space Systems division obviously couldn't operate any more. The Space+Communication division had to hire NASA to launch the very first communication satellite.

2. As soon as the ban was lifted, companies like Virgin Galactica showed up.

Why other countries did not step up into the breach? The answer is three fold:

1. Most other countries were much much poorer than the US in the 50's, 60's and 70's.

2. The high pay in the US by NASA led to a brain drain in those other countries. NASA is known for having a large number of non-native born scientists and engineers.

3. When the Europeans and Japanese finally became rich enough to explore space, they copied the NASA monopoly in their respective countries. Partly because some of those bosses were ex-members of NASA.

Given the post-WWI (notice, not WWII) economic reality on this planet, the only place available for rapid free market pioneering engineering undertaking was the US. That's why the US led the way in the mass production and popularization of the automobile in the 20's, 30's, 40's, 50's; civil aviation in the 30's, 40's (with war interruption of course), 50's, 60's, and 70's; computers in the 30's, 40's, 50's, 60's,70's, 80's, 90's, 00's; communication technology in the 80's, 90's, 00's. Space technology unfortunately is the area where the US banned free market innovation for half a century. That's why the Soviets/Russians were/are a match, currently actually ahead as NASA does not have any reliable manned launch vehicle in service whereas the Russians do.




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