Technologically complicated, Politically easy, "far out projects" or "moonshots", governments are relatively good. eg. putting the first man on the moon (politically easy: because of the competition with Russia).
Technologically easy, Politically complicated, "large scale projects", governments are (as the data shows) really, really bad at. eg. reforming the education system.
Some rationale: Humans looking for authority that then gain it, don't want to lose it. i.e. The dislike disruption. Government is run by humans with authority. It would then follow that governments don't like disruption.
Its extremely hard to politically justify disenfranchising all the poor performing teachers, administration, budget planners, healthcare workers, etc. even if it is actually in the best overall interest of society. Primarily because governments are a monopoly, and its in the best interest of all management (lower, middle or upper) in a monopoly to keep their controlling interests intact (and happy), regardless of productivity. As they say "keep things churning".
Are you sure? Finland government did pretty good in reforming education system..
> governments are a monopoly
No they are not! Bad governments, maybe. But ideally, they should be democratically controlled by the population, and then the usage of the term "monopoly" is meaningless. (Not to mention that each nation competes with other nations.)
These are the types of projects where a single billionaires great wealth can inspire other investors to come along. If Musk couldn't pour millions into his ventures, it's unlikely the average investor would have followed him into space.
In addition, the USA invested in the internet, space and atomic weapons solely for the purpose of war, even the hubble is based on military technologies. I am again concerned that people are arguing for a future that's dependent on the needs of politicians or the military.
Even China was smart enough to see value in the capitalism model. Allow for the ability of great wealth, allow the private citizen to decide how to deploy the fruits of their work and something good might come out it.
Also, the Government has taken over a billion dollars in tax from Mark Zuckerberg, so the Government has plenty to play with. Remember, it's always easier to play with other people's money, hence the inefficiency regarding the use of tax dollars.
I think I'd feel more comfortable with corporation(s) competing with the government, because then, you could "vote against them with your dollar." Another thing which is done in government labs in the US is having labs/universities compete with each other for funding (although whether this yields good incentives for research is another story, and we're trying to find avenues for innovation that are difficult for the government, and ostensibly, difficult for govt labs too).
Finally, if we do accept this form of oligarchy (where one oligarch is the government we vote for), no doubt will we have entities which disagree with each other, say, Soros or the Koch brothers. Now, then, the rest of us just become the grass at the feet of fighting elephants[0], and I hell don't know how anyone would feel comfortable with that. I suppose the only option you have then for having a voice is to become the next elephant, and while I love hacking/disruption as the next guy, I know statistics too, and I won't delude myself I will become Zuckerberg or even four orders of magnitude near him.
[0] http://www.afriprov.org/african-proverb-of-the-month/27-2001...
Not necessarily. People can still organize, collect wealth and build a large scale project themselves. Or the bureaucrats running companies can organize and together finance big projects. There are many other possibilities.
> allow the private citizen to decide how to deploy the fruits of their work
Assuming these really are their fruits, which is pretty disputable in case of very wealthy people.
> it's always easier to play with other people's money
I agree, and this is actually the reason why one person owning a billion may be more willing to invest to crazy projects than a thousand people owning million each.