[OT]: How to help a Canadian Spaceport?

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Mon, Oct 29, 2007 at 05:35:01PM +0000, Christopher Browne wrote:
> Let me take a contrary view on this, and not from the perspective of
> "oh, I don't want any space stuff happening"...

Ehm, last I checked Canada was pretty far north, and not very close to
an optimal launch point for anything going into space.  No point making
space ports here.

> Why should the Federal Government spend a lot of money to subsidize tourists?
> 
> If they cannot or will not pay enough to attract the infrastructure,
> why should the government take on the risk?
> 
> This would expressly be a case of "corporate welfare," of subsidizing
> a specific set of companies, and not for any value I can really see.
> 
> When I lived in the US, I did see some of this sort of thing happening
> in the sports industry, where professional teams have gotten into the
> habit of moving to whichever city offers to spend the most on giving
> them a "free" stadium.  It was (and is) a corrupt practice.  The
> cities would then pass on the cost by imposing surtaxes on hotels and
> rental cars, and the fact that this would be paid almost exclusively
> by non-voters made the practice palatable to city councils and their
> voters.
> 
> To be consistent with that practice, we might set up a "Canadian Space
> Tourism Program" where all foreigners visiting the country would be
> charged $10/day during their visit to help subsidize our space
> program.
> 
> Better still:  Impose an extra 1% GST on all foreigners in the
> country.  They don't vote, so they can't meaningfully oppose it.

And the government would spend twice that much just to administrate the
GST difference (never mind what it would cost the poor stores to deal
with the crap).  We could stop letting tourists get GST/PST refunds when
they leave.  That might actually make money and save money since you
wouldn't have to administrate that silly system anymore. :)

> It's all just a way of making it work...

--
Len Sorensen
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