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Civilian use is wide yes, but this is only because it is provided for free by DoD. None of those uses would be economically viable if they had to bear the costs
by Phlarp 8y ago
Civilian use is wide yes, but this is only because it is provided for free by DoD. None of those uses would be economically viable if they had to bear the costs of developing, launching and maintaining the system.
Keeping track of the boats and missiles pays the bills. Everything else is just a happy accident of zero marginal use cost.
- sneak 8y agoIt’s not provided for free by DoD. We pay for it with taxes. Civilians do indeed bear the cost in full. I am not sure I understand where you are going with this. Doing war stuff with GPS does not generate any revenue. It costs American citizens the same amount of dollars regardless of whether it is used for war or not. It’s not national, and it’s not security.
- Phlarp 8y agoMost of the world does not pay US taxes, it's completely free to them. At this point I just assume you are trolling.
- ricw 8y agoEvery GPS device pays a couple of cents to use the system, regardless of country. Whilst this initially may have been peanuts, I’d be pretty sure that this is a self-paying system by now.
- Phlarp 8y agoSure there is a royalty on some of the key parts of receiver hardware and software, but if you think that even comes close to the cost of the whole system you are in for a rude awakening. Those royalties won't have even paid for the original GPS sats, let alone the newer stuff going up in modern times. The cheapest Iridium phone service plan is $50/month for just 10 minutes of talk time. Would you pay $50/month for 10 minutes of GPS navigation a month?
- xvilka 8y agoGalileo GNSS proves you wrong, since initially was designed primarily for civilian use.
- meepmorp 8y agoGalileo’s being primarily civilian in focus has no bearing on GPS’ main purpose. GPS is a US system, funded and directed by the military.
- xvilka 8y agoYou are right, but it proves that GNSS system can be civilian primarily and would be still feasible.
- enraged_camel 8y agoNice goal post moving.
- burfog 8y agoGalileo GNSS is publicly justified as being primarily for civilian use. Navstar-GPS works fine though, so there must be some other reason. Possibilities: military use, jobs program, pride, etc.
- extrapickles 8y agoIt still economically viable for large governments to make their own for just civilian use, under the same logic that has government funding roads, parks and other public goods. The GPS system cost ~$12 billion to make, and needs ~$750 million a year in maintenance (mainly launching new stats as they have a service life of 15 years). This means it costs each US taxpayer $5/year to run. Quite a few road/subway projects cost more than the GPS system.