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Ok look I'm all against the BS they're pulling but lets not forget the fact SpaceX has made anything space related significantly cheaper than NASA ever could in the same timeframe. The money lost on these experiments is peanuts compared to what they've saved already AND are needed to progress towards our space-age. I really hope with France putting more money towards competing with SpaceX we'll have an EU alternative that can actually compete on price.
This is how spaceX made launches cheaper:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5cZEZoa8rW0
By not following regulations and ruining a town that homes more than 100 000 people.
To be fair, the person you're responding to is probably talking about the falcon 9 which was developed in California. Brownsville on the other hand is being ruined by a space program that makes no fucking sense and will likely fail in the end.
As much as it's fun to hate on Musk. The Spaceship program is already cheaper than any other option, even if the second stage never becomes reusable.
If all they do is gut the starship so it's a little lighter and more reliable, and keep the reusable booster, it's going to cut the cost of putting large and heavy payloads into orbit.
The James Webb telescope would have been significantly cheaper and easier to build and launch if Starship was available. There was an enormous amount of science that was cut at NASA due to the cost and time overruns from the overly complex build.
It still may never be a real option for lunar missions without the reusability and refueling, but just the ability to send huge things to earth orbit is a giant success.
The American way
Counterpoint: we don't need a space age (yet).