Bezos defends Blue Origin flight as some question benefits of space tourism

WASHINGTON (SBG) — When the world’s richest man returned from his brief trip to suborbital space Tuesday, he was greeted by a mix of praise, criticism, and outright mockery, as the debate over the costs and benefits of private space flight intensified.

Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, was the second billionaire in two weeks to travel to the edge of space, after Richard Branson of Virgin Galactic did so earlier this month. Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s SpaceX venture was the first private company to send humans into orbit and up to the International Space Station last year, though Musk has not yet taken a flight himself.

“We need to build a road to space,” Bezos said in an interview with CNN later Tuesday. “I mean, build infrastructure, reusable space vehicles, and so on, so that the next generations can build the future.”

On the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, Bezos, his brother, and two others flew 66 miles above the Earth in Blue Origin’s New Shepard capsule, returning safely to the ground after 11 minutes. Bezos, who recently stepped down from his role at Amazon, founded Blue Origin in 2000 and has reportedly poured more than $5 billion of his own money into the company.

“I want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for all this,” Bezos said at a news conference after the flight.

That statement from the founder of a company that has often been criticized for harsh working conditions and blocking unionization of its employees drew swift condemnation from progressives. Some also noted recent ProPublica reporting that showed Bezos paid no income taxes in 2007 and 2011, and Amazon paid no federal taxes from 2016 to 2018.

“Jeff Bezos forgot to thank all the hardworking Americans who actually paid taxes to keep this country running while he and Amazon paid nothing," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

Experts on space policy say the closely watched Blue Origin flight, as well as recent efforts by Virgin Galactic and SpaceX, demonstrate that a massive undertaking that used to be exclusively within the purview of governments is now within reach for private enterprise. The ramifications of that development could be momentous, or it could just lead to more rich people launching themselves into the upper atmosphere.

“It’s a shift in space activity from space being the realm of huge government programs... to something that technologically can be achieved even by private industry,” said Mariel Borowitz, an associate professor at Georgia Tech who served as a policy analyst for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate from 2016 to 2018.

Given the rarity of private space launches and the few companies offering them, seats on these rockets have carried price tags ranging from hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of dollars. However, advocates for the commercial space industry maintain prices will eventually drop.

“This is just the beginning of our collective efforts to democratize access to space,” the Commercial Spaceflight Federation said in response to Blue Origin’s successful launch.

“Their price point is within the reach of a fairly large group of wealthy people,” said John Logsdon, founder and former director of the George Washington University Space Policy Institute. “Until they get the price down, it’s going to be a niche business for the rich.”

Although Bezos acknowledged the thrill of fulfilling a lifelong dream to travel into space, he also framed his mission as the first step in an ambitious plan to save humanity from itself. Blue Origin is laying the foundation to eventually move polluting industries and possibly trillions of people off this “fragile” planet.

At a media event in 2019, Bezos outlined his vision for miles-long space colonies housing millions of people, living off solar power and resources culled from the moon and asteroids. The idea was inspired by a professor he met as a student at Princeton University who argued all industrial activity could be moved off-planet within a century.

“I know this sounds fantastical, and it is fantastical,” Bezos told CNN’s Anderson Cooper Tuesday. “But remember, if you went back to the Kitty Hawk era and showed them a 787, they would think that's fantastical.”

Blue Origin is hoping to parlay the excitement surrounding Bezos’ flight into more private capsule launches and new government contracts that could bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. SpaceX, with its longer track record of flights, has already won contracts with NASA and the Pentagon worth nearly $3 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Upon his return from space, Branson said he aims to make space travel “more accessible to all,” but tickets for Virgin Galactic flights have so far been priced around $250,000. The company has claimed roughly 600 reservations are booked for future flights, and Musk is among those with a ticket.

“To the next generation of dreamers: If we can do this, just imagine what you can do,” Branson told The Wall Street Journal after he landed. “And I look forward to you all following your dreams and doing wonderful things.”

Musk’s ambitions for his company are much farther-reaching. SpaceX is dedicated to the eventual colonization of Mars and “making humanity interplanetary,” and the CEO has predicted he could send a manned mission to the red planet as early as 2026.

All those potential outcomes remain far in the future, if they are attainable at all. It is not clear how quickly companies can bring down the cost of recreational space flight, and building space colonies and power plants on the moon would require decades of investment and technological advancement.

“Colonizing Mars and moving heavy industry to space is something for, at best, the second half of this century,” Logsdon said.

Still, two high-profile flights in a matter of weeks, with all three companies planning more launches later in the year, represent significant progress toward the privatization of space travel. After years of grandiose promises deflated by lengthy delays, these launches could lend momentum to Bezos and Musk’s loftier aspirations.

“I think I am more optimistic after seeing these flights that it’s something that could eventually happen, assuming it’s what we want,” Borowitz said.

While detractors have been quick to dismiss these trips as vanity exercises, the technology developed in the course of space exploration can have broader applications and produce tangible benefits on the ground.

“All of the money spent on space exploration is spent in employing people on the ground, both directly and through the supply chain, who contribute to their communities... There are also a large number of technologies that initially were required to make space exploration possible and are now improving life on Earth,” said David Alexander, director of the Rice Space Institute.

Even if this is all about rich men playing astronaut, some say there is not necessarily anything wrong with that. Bezos and Branson have invested large sums of their own money in these businesses, and boarding flights themselves helped drum up free publicity that could attract more investors and customers.

“They’re not there to benefit society,” Logsdon said. “They’re there to make money.”

Complaints about the costs of space exploration are nothing new. Public opinion polls throughout the 1960s found most Americans felt the government was spending too much on the Apollo program, and civil rights activists were particularly vocal in opposition to sending a handful of white men into space while millions lived in poverty on Earth.

Attitudes shifted over time as the public came to view the achievements of the space program more positively, and by the 1990s, a majority believed the benefits of investing in space exploration outweighed the costs. However, there was still significant resistance to increasing NASA’s budget or pursuing manned missions to Mars.

As NASA looks to resume manned space flights and send astronauts back to the moon in the coming years, private companies funded by billionaires have become vital partners. SpaceX and Blue Origin are currently fighting over a contract to build the lunar landing vehicle for a planned 2024 NASA mission.

“Elon Musk and SpaceX have shown that they provide value add to NASA and less expensive options for private companies who have aspirations in space,” Alexander said.

That value is not enough to satisfy some critics. Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Ore., proposed legislation Tuesday that would impose an excise tax on private space flights that have no scientific value. He likened it to taxes charged on plane tickets and warned against space travel becoming “a tax-free holiday for the wealthy.”

Others on the left cited Bezos’ ability to spend billions to propel himself into space for 11 minutes as justification for a wealth tax. They argue the money spent advancing his plan to someday move some heavy industries off Earth would be better spent fighting climate change right now, alleviating homelessness and poverty, or providing better benefits to his workers.

“Maybe there's a problem with an economic system which sees a handful of billionaires grow their wealth massively during a pandemic, and zoom around space in rocket ships, while millions of people struggle to keep a roof over their heads in the richest country on Earth,” tweeted Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Wednesday.

Bezos dismissed the notion that he must choose between solving immediate earthly problems and his long-term vision to save the planet. He announced two $100 million donations through a new charity initiative after he landed Tuesday, and Amazon has already committed to investing in achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2040.

“We have to work on the here and now, and we have to look to the future,” he told CNN. “And we, as a society, as a civilization, as humanity, we have always done that.”

Experts agree it is a mistake to view investing in space tourism as a distraction from addressing terrestrial crises. Beyond the potential gains that could come directly from the work entrepreneurs like Bezos, Branson, and Musk are funding, Borowitz suggested the excitement of a new privately funded space race could inspire more students to pursue careers in science and technology and spur further innovations far into the future.

“It shouldn’t be space flight and nothing else that matters,” she said, “but, through the history of the human race, you have to work on multiple problems at once.”