I speculate they feel obligated to give back to the community that has patronized their businesses. This obligation is quite common among capitalists. The Mellon and Rockefeller foundations for example.
Minimum Wage 1962: $1.15... adjusted for inflation is in 2013 $8.89 Current Federal Minimum Wage: $7.25 We treated our low income earners better in 1962 then we do now, and I know McDonald's did not have profits in the 5 billions in the 1960's.
The baby boomers fucked this government and economy all up, then try to blame it on the younger generations.
Stealing from the disadvantaged (their underpaid workers) to take credit for helping the disadvanted they created through unfair wages.
Denny, the problem with your point of view is it's overly simplistic for a complicated society. Any Utopian or even highly dogmatic approach to society at large will result in failure (not that our society isn't resulting in failure also). There are wonderful people who will give huge sums for completely altruistic reasons, and others who will do good for PR or some other quid pro quo. But once you extend that to the larger society there just arent enough of them. I have one super-rich (poor by super rich standards, but has 9 figures) in my extended family. I know he gives to some charities, but according to my mom, just a few pennies here and there. Even his children have to beg and plead for a modicum of assistance. Some people are just not giving. And programs need to be able to count on a steady year over year money flow to be able to invest correctly and get decent people working there. For me, all i know are NIH grants in the sciences. Sure, One billionaire might donate to cancer, and another to ALS, but there are thousands of puzzle pieces that each need to be worked on to push forward the whole scientific foundation and create the platform for growth of our knowledge and our economy. Most scientific discoveries are 10+ steps away from being being able to make money from, so no business will invest in this research. They would have no idea if it might even lead anywhere their business is focused on. But, all investment in the sciences pays back 4X into the greater economy. Invest 1 buck, it is returned as 4, but not directly. I figure out one thing, that's used by another lab for another thing, and on, and on, and on, and on, and then there is some discovery that shows promise to pursue and business will jump in here and capture huge profits. Those profits are based on many earlier discoveries. My point is that there are complexities that Ayn Rand's philosophies can't really handle. I agree that there should be more freedom, but we can't just trust business. They will pollute for example. They will cut safety corners. Let's take that for a minute. Your response i imagine will be something along the lines of 'If the business is unsafe, employees will go elsewhere'. Well, what if those unsafe practices become ubiquitous. Then people will still need to work, so it's work somewhere unsafe or starve to death. What about in the industrial revolution, all those factories, one after another paid a pittance and were highly unsafe. Or right now in many countries around the world, where there aren't a plethora of jobs, there are all sorts of unsafe situations. We are a huge group of 300,000,000 people and a hive of that mass needs more organization than a hive of 50. Our complex society can t rely on the whims of the rich, can't rely on the benevolence of the wealthy. We must make sure there are some rules and guidelines in place. We must make sure certain programs are paid for. We must make sure there are safety nets for those that are sick or deranged. This is a complex place and your overly simplistic answer doesn't cover it.
GOD: For your benefit... I did a little research. http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/seind12/c4/c4h.htm The business sector continues to account for most of both U.S. R&D performance and R&D funding. * The business sector performed an estimated $282 billion of R&D in 2009, or 71% of the U.S. total, drawing on business, federal sources, and other sources of R&D support. The business sector itself provided an estimated $247 billion of funding for R&D in 2009, or 62% of the U.S. total; almost all of which supported R&D performed by business. * The levels of business R&D performance and funding were both higher in 2008 than in 2009 ($291 billion and $259 billion, respectively). Even with the decline in 2009, expanded business spending has accounted for most of the nation's R&D growth over the last 5 years. * The academic sector is the second-largest performer of U.S. R&D, accounting for an estimated $54 billion in 2009, or about 14% of the national total. * The federal government is the second-largest funder of U.S. R&D, providing an estimated $124 billion, or 31% of the U.S. total in 2009.
First, not all R&D is the same or has the same value towards our community. Developing a new larger mouth on a beer can and determining the exact pathways used in macrophage signaling both fall under the same umbrella in your post. Second, I think it's wonderful that business is able to pour so much into R&D and I want that to continue. I want business to get filthy rich off of their research. Lastly, much of the research being done by business is built on a foundation of knowledge amassed via the public sector because there is preliminary research needed that simply follows science wherever it takes us. This info is available for any company to use. If this base research were done by business, the information would not be shared and money would need to be spent 10 times for ten businesses to approach the field. Also, no info would get out or even learned unless there were profit attached. This is a terrible strategy towards building a knowledgable and wealthy future.
We're matching anecdotal evidence? Okay. T. Boone Pickens. The NSF even keeps track of our R&D spending? Man, they listen to everything.
Sorry, but I think you are simply wrong. Before NASA, everything was privately funded (well, a bomb, too). If anything, the more govt. has spent, the lesser quality our education system has become and we're becoming less innovative, too. I look around and see plastic and rubber and steel and treated wood and motors and other things that the govt. had zip, nada, nothing to do with. I think if govt. spent $0, then corporations and charities would pick up the difference and then some. I don't just believe it, I know it. They always did. We got the railroads, steel, newspapers, telegraph, telephone, automobile, airplane, skyscrapers, the Theory of Relativity, and numerous discoveries without govt. mucking it up. Now our innovation is erectile drugs and social networking software. So.... Lets print some money and spend it so we screw up our schools even more and darned if I know if we can innovate beyond social networking software for much longer. If you find your govt funded research project to be rewarding, I assure you that you could easily find a DOW Chemical or big Pharma company that'll fund worthy projects in perpetuity and with more dollars. But hey, someone has to blow taxpayer money on shrimps on treadmills and then spend more doing studies to justify it. Carry on.
