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Very well put. Mariana Mazzucato talks about this idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r1IPsldbBg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3r1IPsldbBg and https://ww

• dnautics 13y ago
  that is a crazy video. You can either take her thesis at her word, or you can read between the lines and realize that this is an incredible outline of how government transfers wealth to the already wealthy. Her suggestion is that the reason why the US is such a dynamic economic system is because the government underwrites it; but this is a flawed concept. In the era 1860-1920 the US government did not underwrite very much scientific or technology or provide SBIRs or any such thing, and you would be hard pressed to argue that the US did not undergo major economic improvement.
  • mooreds 13y ago
    Re 1860-1920, have you heard of the railroad land grants? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Railroad_Acts http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Railroad_Acts These were tremendous gifts to private companies to induce investment in what was one of the high tech industries of the time.
    • dnautics 13y ago
      true. However, there were fabulously successful railroads (e.g. great northern) which were entirely privately funded, even down to securing property easements (which these days would be done using eminent domain). IIRC the great northern was really one of the few railway that didn't suffer a downturn and shutter itself during that era... It's now a part of BNSF.
      • scarmig 13y ago
        It seems remiss to talk about how the Great Northern didn't need any government help when it bought all its land from the federal government after the federal government had acquired control of it by slaughtering most of the land's previous residents.