"Why? I'd rather corporations spend money on RND than the Gov on programs."
R&D would get us fastest nice things like space colonization, longevity, megastructures, the next step on the Kardashev scale.
R&D would get us fastest nice things like space colonization, longevity, megastructures, the next step on the Kardashev scale.
NASA doled out public money to prime contractors for various pieces of the program (North American, Grumman, Rocketdyne, Douglas, IBM...) and the primes subcontracted various pieces as they always do.
This is not to understate the tremendous engineering effort of organizing such a huge program, but it’s not like this achievement was done by a bunch of government workers alone.