Why is so much money wasted on NASA?

Question

Don't you think that those G funds would be of better use elsewhere, like making more Bombs and stuff?

Answer 1

There is no actuall money. NASA has now made it's own community and thrives on it's own.

Answer 2

NASA is not a waste of money although any bureaucracy probably wastes some.

The United States would not exist if people did not have the vision, the desire and the faith to chance a dangerous ocean voyage.

NASA develops leading edge knowledge and technology which benefits America and establishes the US leadership in the world.

Great civilizations are known for there great works. The Egyptians built the pyramids. The Chinese built the wall.
The USA has built rockets and landed man on the moon.

Even the countries that hate America acknowledge your greatness in this field.

Someday America will lead the people of Earth in both exploration and the settlement of new worlds.

Or on a more pragmatic and opportunistic level...
Think how rich the first European powers who exploited the wealth of the New World became.

Before that , Asian and Middle Eastern countries had most of the world's wealth. The country(s) that develop space first gain the military high ground and the advantage of squatters' rights.

America does not have to develop space through NASA, but not doing so merely means someone else will and America will lose its superpower status forever.

Answer 3

Not sure this is even worth responding too.

Go look at the NASA budget and normalize it by the number of days the Agency's yearly budget would sustain the Iraqi War, or the number of months and people that could be paid Well Fair payments, or the equal distribution to all public schools........ you will find it is minuscule in comparison or ability to affect a change.

BTW, the Nasa budget could be given to schools to teach children to be scientist, explorers, and researchers for better bomb making......... yeah, that's a progressive mankind.

Answer 4

How dare you?! NASA is making a lot of progress. I don't understand why so many people complain about NASA and the money that they receive. If anything NASA should get MORE MONEY. Everyone wants to see them go to the moon and then to Mars, but nobody wants to see them get money to do research to PREPARE to do those things. Many of the research experiments that NASA conducts have contributed not only to science but to medicine as well. We use NASA's contributions to society EVERYDAY. You asked in another question whether or not you could use your cell phone on Mars... IF you could, you'd have NASA to thank for that. By the way, using it to make more bombs is just another example of how and why society is going to be the cause of its own demise.

Answer 5

Comparatively speaking, NASA really only receives a very meager percentage of the total government expenditure.

It is no secret as to what the exact amount of yearly funding is received by NASA, it is readily available on line for all to see.
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/107488main_FY06_low.pdf
In 2006, NASA's budget was $16,456.3 million. This may seem like a lot by ordinary standards, but it is really not a lot in the grand scheme of things.
When compared to government mandatory spending (spending on things such as social security, interest on bonds, ...., things which are required by law to be spent), NASA looks like a great deal.
The 2006 total federal yearly budget is $2,568 Billion.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2006/tables.html
Military is also a very significant drain on the budget, albeit we are at war.

If anything, in my opinion, NASA should get more money.
I would hardly consider the NASA budget as "wasted" in any respect. NASA and our space program have been behind many significant technological improvement we enjoy today as well as advance our knowledge of the universe, something which one can hardly put a price tag on.

Answer 6

stulsevoli, where in the hell did you get your very INACCURATE statistics from?? NASA has a 40% rate of killing astronauts??? It's actually closer to 2%. In all of their missions, which is MANY... they've ONLY had 3 MAJOR accidents. The first was with Apollo 1, the second was with the Challenger, and the third was with Columbia. I think you need to do your homework before you start waving numbers around and calling it evidence that NASA is a waste of money.

Answer 7

To Stulsevoli above...trying to use made up statistics to scare people into your beliefs is both ridiculuously stupid and grossly irresponsible.

Actual Statistics...

As of November 2004, 439 individuals have flown on spaceflights: Russia/Soviet Union (96), USA (277), others (66). Twenty-two have died while in a spacecraft: Apollo 1 (3), Soyuz 1 (1), X-15-3(1), Soyuz 11 (3), Challenger (7), Columbia (7), totaling 18 astronauts (4.1%) and 4 cosmonauts (0.9% of all the people launched).

And it can be added that Discorvery has gone up and returned safely twice since these stats were released, thereby even lowering the fatality rate.

Please show me how this amounts to a 40% kill rate...idiot.

Answer 8

1. Nasa does not make bombs (perhaps they make stuff)
2. most of the things our government spends money on are a bigger waste than NASA
3. private entities could and should take over many of the things that the US government currently does, but space exploration is probably one of the things that the private sector can't gear up to do, at least in the early stages like now

so, yes, there are probably some better uses, but there are way way way more worse uses for our tax dollars

I am glad some of my taxes go toward space exploration

Answer 9

lets see... killing more of us versus finding a potential way to expand our civilization beyond the petty border disputes and ancient arguments over land and cities (jerusalem cough cough)?

Also, NASA is responsible for spinning off many of its discovered technologies to the private/commercial sector... like lazers, teflon, aerogel, on and on; not to mention the advances that NASA's jet propulsion lab makes each year in improving and innovating aircraft features.

You seem to like funding military stuff... do you really think this new F35 (or whatever the designation is for the Joint Strike Fighter) would be possible at ALL without NASA? think again! Theyve also installed many things the military uses, like our much beloved GPS system.

Answer 10

If it's bombs and stuff you care about then you should be aware of NASA's massive contributions to our military. Thanks to NASA, we can find targets for the bombs, aim the bombs, fire the bombs, direct the boms, and hit the targets with the bombs.

But this is just one of the thousands of contributions the space program has made to the world. I suggest you research the subject before making such a presumptious statment.

Answer 11

Virtually no money is wasted on NASA. Virtually all of it goes to research projects including the shuttle and space station. Measured in constant dollars, NASA budget peaked in 1966 and in 2006 is about 2/3 of what it was in 1966. We get quite a bit for our money.

The 2005 budget for NASA was $16.1 billion. The total federal budget was $2.4 trillion. Thus, the portion devoted to NASA was 0.67 percent.