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Re: Look up SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo
Posted by Reality (more from Reality) on Mon, 23 Apr 2012 09:41:22
In Reply to: Re: Look up SpaceShipTwo and WhiteKnightTwo, Joeychess, Mon, 23 Apr 2012 08:38:39
The initial high cost is due to low volume of production. Remember the days when the personal computer cost 5 figures? The competitive private market is especially good at bringing the prices down over time, rapidly. The early adopters are well-heeled enthusiasts. Given the frequency of 6-figure party events all around the world in the past two decades, finding passengers for the space flight on the way to Australia should not be too hard. The PanAm Clipper flight in the 1930's from San Francisco to Manila and Hong Kong were $1710 round trip; since gold was $35/oz after FDR revluation, that translates to 49 ounces, or close to $70k in today's money in equivalent gold terms. Over long periods of time, gold value actually lags behind the increase of real disposable income, that's how real living standards improve. A new car at the time was about $200, vs. today's $25k. So the PanAm ticket price was equivalent of 8.5 cars, or about $200k today! The PanAM Clipper service was packed and highly profitable.

All bureaucracies' first priority is self-perpetration. Government bureaucracies can only survive by robbing taxpayers. That is not to say, all government bureaucracies are unjustified in the absolute sense: some governments can be decent place holders keeping out even more rapacious ones.

Werner von Braun was inspired by American private rocketeers. German taxpayers were looted by their government to support Braun and his crew as war effort. They were in turn looted by the Allied governments. Too bad both the US and Soviet governments decided to keep the loot to themselves instead of giving the know-how to their citizens and companies that were interested in space exploration and utilization, and more importantly each monopolized space engineering through government agencies.


posted by 75.67.1...
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