In fact, this is a really common thing we see in the market/government dichotomy: the market doesn't, and shouldn't, have a stomach for long term, high risk plays that could possibly benefit all of society. That's not the point. The government handles those levels of investments on a much longer time scale, allowing the market to exploit the technological platforms made by our government. We see this pattern with the space race, the internet etc.: government does the big heavy lifting in the 20-40 year time frame, then VC and the market comes along and "digests" those changes for the marketplace.

Here is an excellent book that describes this relationship in far greater detail: https://www.amazon.com/Doing-Capitalism-Innovation-Economy-S...