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It's ridiculous what amounts of money these ventures can siphon away in the US. See Uber, AirBNB, etc. I'm not saying they don't pay off, but these businesses l

by oblio 3y ago

It's ridiculous what amounts of money these ventures can siphon away in the US. See Uber, AirBNB, etc. I'm not saying they don't pay off, but these businesses literally choke most international competition. There are probably 1-2 countries in the world that can afford to keep running a business with losses at around $1bn per year.

pixl97 3y ago
$1b loss in the space industry is probably the smallest loss for any business in said industry in history. Every launch of the space shuttle was a few billion used up. There has been no completion here, because before SpaceX everyone else was launching 100M-1B+ of rocket that was never reused and other than the payload was a write off. It is always financed by government because there is typically a much larger generalized payoff for the nation state involved regarding capabilities.
- oblio 3y ago
  Yeah, I'm not talking strictly about SpaceX. I don't know if I have the exact name, but I'm quite sure that one of the big unicorns, probably Uber, was running for several years with multi-billion dollar losses. Again, that's utterly unthinkable for Mercedes or Renault or Mitsubish or Samsung or... They'd just go under because the rest of the world still has economic gravity, i.e. everything must come down in case of no profits.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- mcpackieh 3y ago
  > Every launch of the space shuttle was a few billion used up. Almost all of that money was dumped back into the same economy from which it was collected, albeit inefficiently, so it didn't really disappear. They "used up" a few million dollars worth of material each time. The damage to the economy was not as bad as you suggest. However the opportunity cost was massive. Decades wasted on a dead-end program. A staggering number of engineer careers essentially wasted, and now they're doing it again with SLS.
fnordpiglet 3y ago
I think many governments with state industry routinely run massive deficits in those state industries, and as an extension, state funded industries. Space is such an industry.

by oblio 3y ago

pixl97 3y ago

$1b loss in the space industry is probably the smallest loss for any business in said industry in history. Every launch of the space shuttle was a few billion used up. There has been no completion here, because before SpaceX everyone else was launching 100M-1B+ of rocket that was never reused and other than the payload was a write off. It is always financed by government because there is typically a much larger generalized payoff for the nation state involved regarding capabilities.

oblio 3y ago
Yeah, I'm not talking strictly about SpaceX. I don't know if I have the exact name, but I'm quite sure that one of the big unicorns, probably Uber, was running for several years with multi-billion dollar losses. Again, that's utterly unthinkable for Mercedes or Renault or Mitsubish or Samsung or... They'd just go under because the rest of the world still has economic gravity, i.e. everything must come down in case of no profits.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
mcpackieh 3y ago
> Every launch of the space shuttle was a few billion used up. Almost all of that money was dumped back into the same economy from which it was collected, albeit inefficiently, so it didn't really disappear. They "used up" a few million dollars worth of material each time. The damage to the economy was not as bad as you suggest. However the opportunity cost was massive. Decades wasted on a dead-end program. A staggering number of engineer careers essentially wasted, and now they're doing it again with SLS.

fnordpiglet 3y ago

I think many governments with state industry routinely run massive deficits in those state industries, and as an extension, state funded industries. Space is such an industry.