Aldrin and Armstrong are NASA astronauts. They spent the best years of their lives wholly bought into the centrally-funded prime-contractor system. They were at

Aldrin and Armstrong are NASA astronauts. They spent the best years of their lives wholly bought into the centrally-funded prime-contractor system. They were at the absolute apex of that system, and they and a very small handful of astronauts reaped the fame and opportunity that enormous Apollo (400k people according to wikipedia) program. SpaceX is doing orbital missions with around 1000 people. This means cheaper flights which means more flights. It's going to lead to the same democratization of access that the computing and network revolutions brought, pulling these technologies out of enormous institutions and dramatically dropping costs.