People seem to ignore the benefits of national goals like the space race. Look at the surge in Physics PhD’s during the Apollo program: https://www.aps.org/ca

People seem to ignore the benefits of national goals like the space race. Look at the surge in Physics PhD’s during the Apollo program: https://www.aps.org/careers/statistics/upload/trends-phd0214.pdf https://www.aps.org/careers/statistics/upload/trends-phd0214... “I want to grow up and work for NASA, be an astronaut, etc” can give people the desire to work harder on their education. There’s a halo effect.