On the frontiers of knowledge, people furthest out know what problems need to be worked on and what research needs to be done. You don’t need the government blindly throwing darts at the wall hoping that one of them hits a bullseye and calling it “basic science”.

I’m open to the idea that government can play a role here, but only in a very small way. The government is spending hundreds of billions of dollars on research. They are such a huge consumer of talent and resources that they are crowding out private initiative. This ain’t Bell Labs of the 1950’s. And if you asked those researchers what they think of today’s system, I’m sure they’d be appalled.