[Blackstrat]

Simple, politicians are short sighted and do what gets them the most votes. They’ll get more votes by virtue signaling about the poor, the environment, or whatever the hot topic of the day happens to be. And it’s incredibly easy to rationalize. Since government spending is boundless, especially in the modern monetary era, hard decisions aren’t necessary. So politicians latch onto the same types of arguments presented in this thread and focus on pandering for reelection. In reality, yes landing on the moon is dangerous. Contrary to the posts here, the moon is incredibly valuable and thus ultimately profitable which is why private companies will likely beat the US back to the surface. An argument can be made that no one other than Trump would have pushed this as hard AND how hard would he have pushed without China’s growing space program? As for things like teacher salaries? Yes, in some places, they are abysmal. OTH, overall US educational quality lags other countries significantly. Higher teacher salaries must come from reforms, which includes reducing the bureaucracy surrounding education substantially, starting at the federal level and working down to the local. I live in a major US city where the superintendent of schools makes roughly 10x the average teachers’ salary, despite presiding over a failed school system. That is unacceptable.