During the Apollo era NASA was receiving nearly 5% of the federal budget. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/NASA-Budget-Federal.svg/288

During the Apollo era NASA was receiving nearly 5% of the federal budget. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/NASA-Budget-Federal.svg/2880px-NASA-Budget-Federal.svg.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/NA... Apollo was a development and technical marvel. I don't think I would necessarily consider it done in an "optimal way" except for optimizing for time at great expense. Artemis certainly isn't fiscally optimal either, mostly driven by a bunch of stipulations in their budget placed there by senators from states where all of these Shuttle-derived parts are built.