Newsflash for you: in the fields I know (medical research), nearly every important early stage research project is funded by philanthropy. Government research d

Newsflash for you: in the fields I know (medical research), nearly every important early stage research project is funded by philanthropy. Government research dollars are only available to groups that have already done that early stage research and proven that the next step is incremental and low-risk. If medical research relied on government dollars, nothing much would happen except for wheel spinning at vast cost. It would be even more of a full employment program for connected research institutes than is already the case. That is not even to start on the fact that the existence of big government funding comes with the existence of the FDA, an entity that enormously increases the cost of research and development, outright blocks many lines of work, makes others so unprofitable as to scare away for-profit funding at all levels, and so on.