>but the cost of this is the society around it a) can't afford to run meaningful not-for-profit space projects
How so? SpaceX spends money in the US, meaning they generate taxes which directly increase the government's ability to run more expensive not-for-profit space projects. The problem is that the government decides to spend only 0.5% of its funds on NASA.
The same argument goes for all your other points. SpaceX spending money means they employ people (both directly, and indirectly by buying stuff), which should always improve the overall situation for society (even if the jobs were bad, the fact that people choose to take the jobs means that having the job is better than the job not existing). It also means they generate lots of taxes, which improves the government's ability to do all the other stuff you list.
Megaproject like SpaceX seem like a good thing for society no matter how you look at it (unless you assume Elon Musk should donate all his money to a better cause, but that seems unreasonable in a capitalistic system).
Megacooperations like Apple might be another matter. Apple takes money in the US, uses it for production in China, and keeps the profits stashed in tax havens. You could argue that this activity is harmful.
>they generate taxes which directly increase the government's ability
SpaceX _received_ a lot of tax money, and megacorporations in general tend not to pay anywhere near as much tax as they "should", so in this sense is likely to be a net negative in terms of short term government finances.
There's also a lot of industries in which the capitalist model produces something much less efficient than alternatives. Public transport, healthcare, et cetera - I'm not sure we have enough information to suggest for sure that space travel is likely to be one of these, but I don't think it's an obvious "win" to privatize either, especially not to the point we can suggest that giving taxpayer dollars to for-profit spacex instead of not-for-profit nasa is the best thing to do.
>even if the jobs were bad, the fact that people choose to take the jobs means that having the job is better than the job not existing
This is, I think, a very dangerous argument. If the existence of megacorporations was taken to its logical conclusion, with a handful of monopolies, where workers rights were removed and all the power went into the hands of the companies, _this would still be true_. Even a hypothetical hypercapitalist dystopia can still point to a choice between "work for peanuts or die" as saying it's better to have the job than not.
Regardless, it can also be true for a company to be a net negative for society overall while still being beneficial for a small number of direct employees. That merges into the ethical concerns of automation basically immediately, for example.
Yes, but most of that money was either for doing resupply missions to the ISS for developing the capability of tranporting humans to the ISS. The resupply missions to the ISS are cheaper than what NASA can do themselves, and SpaceX transporting crew is likely to save money compared to Russia doing it (because Russia raised the prices as competition disappeared). So in a very real sense the government is gaining money here by spending less on something they need anyways.
>There's also a lot of industries in which the capitalist model produces something much less efficient than alternatives. Public transport
It's rare to have a public transport system set up to even allow for fair and open competition. Most started as state monopolies and transitioned to private monopolies (which are hardly capitalism). The areas of transportation where the capitalist model actually happens seem to do great (for example airlines, with the possible exception of the united states where mergers and consolidation seem to limit competition).
>This is, I think, a very dangerous argument. If the existence of megacorporations was taken to its logical conclusion, with a handful of monopolies, where workers rights were removed and all the power went into the hands of the companies, _this would still be true_.
Just to be clear, I am against monopolies and for government-ensured workers rights. But in a hypothetical scenario where workers rights vanish, workers still continue to be a limited resource. If I offer a job, but everybody willing and able to work already has a better one I won't find a candidate. I have to make the job desirable enough to outcompete everyone else looking for employees (for example by raising pay or improving working conditions). The more jobs offered on the market, the higher that competition.
With higher unemployment of course the bargaining power of the individual emplyee sinks, and with that the working conditions and pay. But high unemployment also means higher social unrest, which means the state is incentiviced to provide sufficient benefits/insurance/whatver to keep the unemployed happy, simultanously giving the employees another way out of entirly undesirable jobs.
The true danger is if companies try to find creative ways to make their job "attractive" without actually benefitting the person employed, or if they manage to prevent employees from switch to a better job. That's where exploitation begins.
How so? SpaceX spends money in the US, meaning they generate taxes which directly increase the government's ability to run more expensive not-for-profit space projects. The problem is that the government decides to spend only 0.5% of its funds on NASA.
The same argument goes for all your other points. SpaceX spending money means they employ people (both directly, and indirectly by buying stuff), which should always improve the overall situation for society (even if the jobs were bad, the fact that people choose to take the jobs means that having the job is better than the job not existing). It also means they generate lots of taxes, which improves the government's ability to do all the other stuff you list.
Megaproject like SpaceX seem like a good thing for society no matter how you look at it (unless you assume Elon Musk should donate all his money to a better cause, but that seems unreasonable in a capitalistic system).
Megacooperations like Apple might be another matter. Apple takes money in the US, uses it for production in China, and keeps the profits stashed in tax havens. You could argue that this activity is harmful.