Cold War Science Beat Free Market?

[Benman]

Government spending on certain sciences during and as a result of the cold war (nuclear, rocket, space, moon, computers, etc.) advanced the scientific knowledge ball much further than businenss as usual would have done during the same years. True or false?

[HeavilyArmed]

War does that.

[hmkpoker]

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True or false?

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We need a control group to know the answer.

[moorobot]

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We need a control group to know the answer.

[/ QUOTE ] We need a reason to think that the market would have invested in these things to even have a debate; the market is very short term/myopic in terms of investment and Research and Design; it is very rare for a company to invest in something in which no profit is going to be made for many years, especially if their is a large ammount of risk in terms of whether or not they will make a profit at all.

For one thing, businesses have to stay ahead of the competition in the short term, not just in the long term, but also, most companies fail before far before these "long term payoffs" occur-except corporations, which are not a market construct, and most employess and managers will be gone within a couple of years; in order to get their next job, they of course have to produce positive results for their current company while they are still working at that company. Also, it's very hard to forecast very far into the future.

For large, risky projects like those mentioned in the OP and simply for taking care of R&D generally (R&D has massive positive externalities so is underproduced in the market), the market simply can't be relied on.

[moorobot]

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Government spending on certain sciences during and as a result of the cold war (nuclear, rocket, space, moon, computers, etc.) advanced the scientific knowledge ball much further than businenss as usual would have done during the same years. True or false?

[/ QUOTE ] FYI-most spending on advancing scientific knowledge is still done by the gov't, not by private businesses. So more is still being produced than what would be without the government to assist the market.

[pvn]

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Government spending on certain sciences during and as a result of the cold war (nuclear, rocket, space, moon, computers, etc.) advanced the scientific knowledge ball much further than businenss as usual would have done during the same years. True or false?

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"Scientific Knowledge" isn't some linear thing that you just dump money into and progress along. It can be advanced in different directions, at different rates, and any particular piece of information can be arrived at from different paths.

So, government spending advanced *some aspects* of scientific knowledge further than they would have been without government spending (for example, I feel comfortable thinking that a free market would not have resulted in intercontinental ballistic missle technology that is advanced as what we have today). It also kept other areas back (by diverting funding).

I made a long post about this a while back. I already recycled it once this week, but here it is again:

We know there is a demand for research. There are some vague conjectures that such demand will not be adequately met without government funding, but no reasoning why except that "it's expensive". Part of the reason it's expensive is government itself - the overhead, the waste.

Of course some people want *more* research. Some people want more farm subsidies, too. Why is *your* prefered level of research funding the "correct" level?

An earlier post of mine on the topic:

Research is effectively an economic problem. There are finite resources, there are multiple competing uses for those resorces. In fact, many of these resources (people and material) have uses in other aspects of the economy - meaning you can't seperate research from other economic activity. It's all tied together.

Everyone already acknowleges that market action is superior to government dictation in the "regular" economy - why should research be any different?

Just the bureaucratic bungling is enough to make this decision clear. But there are other considerations. The political meddling (witness stem cell research) is, by itself, reason enough to not allow government to screw with research. Then the moral impropriety of using other people's money - again, by itself enough to make this decision easy.

Effectiveness: advantage market
Objectiveness: advantage market
Respectfulness: advantage market

Yes, people have made great discoveries with government funding. Just think of how much more could have been discovered already without government interference weighing the process down.

[tolbiny]

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Government spending on certain sciences during and as a result of the cold war (nuclear, rocket, space, moon, computers, etc.) advanced the scientific knowledge ball much further than businenss as usual would have done during the same years. True or false?

[/ QUOTE ] FYI-most spending on advancing scientific knowledge is still done by the gov't, not by private businesses. So more is still being produced than what would be without the government to assist the market.

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How can you tell that the businesses aren't just accepting that there is no reason to compete with an entity with a trillion dollar budget and no need to turn a profit when theywill end up basically giving away that tech when they figure it out anyway?

[WordWhiz]

As an example, the airplane was developed entirely on the free market. It wasn't 25 years before we had commercial airline service. A few more decades, and we have jumbo jets taking hundreds of people to every corner of the globe in less than a day--a trip that used to take weeks by train or ship.

Compare that to the space program, a good example of research that the free market would probably not support. Why not? There's no market! We actual benefits we get from sending shuttles into space--at a cost of billions of dollars and several lives--are quite small, when you discount things such as national pride and the "cool factor." Money would be better spent elsewhere.

But we've finally gotten to the point where the private market is researching private space travel, because of the potential for a market. In ten years, we could have thousands of space tourists.

So even in areas where it looks like the free market would never accomplish a particular end, it ends up happening once there is consumer demand. I doubt there's any particular innovation or technology that is so large, and whose benefits are so diffuse, that it could not be accomplished via the free market.

[MrMon]

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As an example, the airplane was developed entirely on the free market.

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No, it wasn't. The Wright Brothers, yes, but a great deal of airplane development was fueled by government interest in certain aspects of the airplane. WW I and II affected aircraft development a great deal, especially in the areas of jet engines and large aircraft, and government interest in the development of airmail was also a large factor in both planes and the development of airlines.

Now, it's not like government dictated what the answer was, it's just that government had certain needs, private industry met them, and then turned around and used that technology to other ends.

[wacki]

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How can you tell that the businesses aren't just accepting that there is no reason to compete with an entity with a trillion dollar budget and no need to turn a profit when they will end up basically giving away that tech when they figure it out anyway?

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Private research sucks at so many forms of basic research it's not even funny.