> In the US neither the original CARES act ($1.4 TN) passed in March, nor the new stimulus bill ($0.9 TN) has any funds dedicated to cutting edge industries.
That's because the US largely doesn't have to do that. The reason the US has a couple hundred major technology companies and Europe doesn't is due to its far superior venture capital market, which Europe almost entirely lacks by relative scale and so it has to try to make up for it with government money (which has been a repeated approach in Europe going back decades now, it hasn't worked well).
This is true. Canada has been trying to spend hundreds of millions or billions (under a series of different names and projects) to develop a domestic SV like tech sector and it keeps failing.
Our smartest people keep leaving to the US and taking US venture capital. Or selling to US companies. All for very good reasons. It’s where the rest of the smart people are. I’m convinced that’s what matters most, the people, not just billions of dollars won’t replace that.
If anything it’s quite obvious the US gov should be investing in infrastructure (transit, urban development, etc) like a good gov instead of venturing into even more territories pretending they can compete with highly advanced industries (be that finance or tech).
These governments, not just US, have enough things they are already struggling to deliver on. I really wouldn’t recommend they also pretend they are venture capitalists or worse starting the organization themselves.
Even old school NASA success was a lucky collection of semi-nationalizing a bunch of already successful private industry, academia, and a hardcore Cold War patriotic mission. And I should note one of the most famous people who helped get the US to the moon was Canadian: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Chamberlin
One could argue NASA slowly lost that powerhouse ability as it became just another hundred billion dollar gov project. They still do great things but nowhere near the scale or speed as the past.
That's because the US largely doesn't have to do that. The reason the US has a couple hundred major technology companies and Europe doesn't is due to its far superior venture capital market, which Europe almost entirely lacks by relative scale and so it has to try to make up for it with government money (which has been a repeated approach in Europe going back decades now, it hasn't worked well).