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The Commercial Spaceflight Federations says that an independent study reveals the new NASA Commercial Crew and Cargo Program funding proposed in the space agency’s FY2011 Budget Request will result in an average of 11,800 direct jobs per year over the next five years, nationwide. “The Tauri Group’s analysis indicates a peak of 14,200 direct jobs in FY2012″ said Brett Alexander, Commercial Spaceflight Federation President, “will result from the design and development of capsules to take astronauts to and from the International Space Station, ‘human rating’ of rockets, upgrades to launch infrastructure at Cape Canaveral, launch vehicle manufacturing, and demonstration launches during the development phase.”
The Tauri Group estimates that from NASA’s proposed spending of $5.8 billion on Commercial Crew and an additional $312 million on Commercial Cargo from FY2011 to FY2015 will create the jobs .
The study used a government economic impact model developed by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and provides average job figures resulting from the assessment of over 50 possible program competition outcomes. The job figures considered only the proposed new NASA funding of $6.1 billion under the Commercial Crew and Commercial Cargo budget lines, so the job figures do not include additional private investment above the NASA funding.
Additionally, jobs created by operational flights of commercial crew vehicles following their development were not included in this study, nor were activities funded under the existing Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program funding of $500 million and the follow-on operational cargo flights to the International Space Station under the $3.5 billion Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) program. Indirect and induced jobs in the communities surrounding these activities were also not included, with only direct jobs being counted.
The Tauri Group study results can be downloaded from the Tauri Group website.
“an average of 11,800 direct jobs per year over the next five years, nationwide. ”
What does this mean?
11.800 jobs for the duration fo 5 years?
And what guarantee is there that this money is actually given and not some vague promis that will be cancelled next year?
The presumption is that, by making spaceflight more available to business minded interests, the space boom will happen and start to provide the funding that the government didn’t want to.
I’ll wager the reality is that space was always open to commercial interests, they just don’t have a reason to care.
Even at a tenth the going price for a seat there is no business opportunity aside from hosting a few rich wannabe spacemen reliving the glory days of Apollo.
Now that we’ve turned our back to that legacy, You need a profitable activity. We’re quickly running out of NASA fanboys and those that are left want to know how they’ll pay the rent.
The most vulnerable bit of this plan is the vague R&D boost, and the only part that means a damn in the end.
Without something to sell this game ends quick.
I don’t think riding a soyuz has anything to do with reliving Apollo.
It shows how much more effective (cheaper) commercial services are.
Also, it is a synergism with the new space tourism industry which is already making money in LEO and looks to be viable all the way up to there. (I.e. from planes to suborbital to orbital.) Looking at similar tourism it is a steady profit source.
But I don’t really need to tell anyone this, because it is obvious. What is interesting is to speculate what, if anything, can be the next viable space industry.
This will mean more after we hear how many jobs at NASA will be lost.
You have to remember it is over 5 years; the majority probably in the 4th and 5th year. You can’t expect the experienced people at NASA to wait 2-5 years. What is the number in the first 2 years?
The more important question… is if the “new” jobs pay a lot less than they do now (likely they will), was there really a gain?