The National Cancer Institute's average yearly budget for cancer research is around $4.9 billion. NFL football revenue? $9 billion. Priorities.
The NFL's revenue is not really a reflection on our priorities. A better comparison would be to other discretionary expenditures in the federal government.
Strong agree that we underspend on this problem.
Isn't it reasonable to assume that, if costumers had different priorities and seek for science research news more often. Then advertisers would, maybe, consider investing in science research instead of football? If we could, somehow, teach and get people interested in science. Then having your brand name associated with the cure of cancer could be more valuable than having your brand associated with football.
It just seems to me that it's a matter of whose priorities are we talking about. You're not wrong, but I have the impression you and noonespecial are talking about different things.
It always seemed to me that we should "take care of our business" first, and then play later. To see these numbers backwards (IMHO) struck me as a childish "play first" attitude. I wouldn't go so far as to say "cancel sports until we get our health problems sorted out" but a shift in priorities would be refreshing.
Football is fun, finally cracking our genome to make disease obsolete (and I think nothing less than 100% of this cures cancer)... now that would be something to cheer about.
This sentiment only works when the "business" is a low hanging fruit. In other words, very doable with reasonable effort with results in the short-term.
Anything else, and you hunker down for the long haul. And that means plenty of playing in the interim. For "business" that can take a lifetime or several lifetimes, no, you should definitely make sure you play and play vigorously.
Nobody should be asked to sacrifice the quality of their life for the sake of hypothetical benefits for future generations.
I don't cut out fun entirely, but I do tend to overwork. I'll be dead soon and have no recollection of 'fun', so I tend to prioritize/maximize my traversal time spent doing academic 'activities' (which are rewarding in their own right).
I still require a basal level of fun to stay sane, though; it would be interesting to quantify it...
Agree, but as tptacek pointed out, there's a lot of commerce happening in football. If majority will shift their concerns to health problems, then the commerce will be happening there. Not sure if it would be necessarily a good thing, and it likely would require strict regulation.
Priorities.
[1]: http://www.rbm.who.int/gmap/1-4.html
edit: That's worldwide funding for Malaria. The US gives only a small fraction of that.
As it turns out, people's priorities are making money.
Or a slightly more weird way to put it... we make a big show of music auditions where millions of people get super-excited and spend money to vote on a person they will most likely never see again in their lives. How do we get people that excited about science?
Apple cleared $100bb predominately selling consumer electronics, should everyone who bought an iPad feel bad for not donating that $600 to cancer research?
Facebook just threw a billion around on a photo sharing company.
Microsoft just threw a billion so it could acquire some more patent ammunition.
Everyday billions and billions of dollars are thrown around to buy all sorts of things, who gets to decide what spending is "right" and what's "wrong?"
>who gets to decide what spending is "right" and what's "wrong?"
None. Noone. Perhaps not wrong. Interesting though.
Sorry guys, guess I kind of ran this one right off the rails. We underspend on medical research proportionally. That was all. I just tried to pick something a little more interesting than the TSA to joust at this time.
Also sorting out the priorities of our society means getting rid of capitalism, and finding a new economic system that works better is (arguably) a harder problem than currying cancer.
I really don't think this is a valid comparison you're making.
I will say, however, that pharmaceutical companies put a tremendous amount of money into researching and marketing treatments for common minor ailments.
But the point is that when we, as a society, allocate resources this way, it is an indication of pathological economic behavior, and we need to find solutions for that.
Mostly I agree with your above point about discretionary government spending though, but it would have been pretty low hanging fruit to just say (once again) that the money spent saving us from terrorists would save a lot more of us from cancer.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3818395
Cancer research... but you need to also factor in cancer treatment costs.