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SpaceX's development money was paid by NASA in exchange for launches, not subsidies. There's a big difference between the two.

• notahacker 9y ago
  It's something of a moot point when I'm really arguing NASA wouldn't exist to pay for launches without tax dollars, but the non-binding launch contracts were structured like a research subsidy with many of the payments being associated with hitting r&d milestones rather than with an obligation to actually render services, and encouragement to go and find other customers. Nothing unusual about that: it's the way the space industry works.
  • greglindahl 9y ago
    That's not a subsidy. That's progress payments. Many industries other than space have progress payments. In fact you see some private contracts which are exactly like that NASA contract: "We want to pay you to create a much cheaper product than we can already buy, and here are some early progress payments so you don't have to finance it yourself." You may think this is a moot point, that's totally fine. The difference between subsidies or not is important to others.
    • notahacker 9y ago
      You'll find private sector contracts which pay in instalments for hitting milestones, but not ones which give companies hundreds of millions of non-reimbursable research dollars without the obligation to buy or sell any actual services or transfer IP or equity. Phase I of COTS was a series of grants for hitting planning milestones with a right to terminate before Phase II. The procurement contracts were separate and subsequent to this.