When will we be able to afford space settlement?

Originally Posted by Dez Akin

I think its well established here that space settlement can't really
progress in the absence of commercial incentive, save for giant
command economy space programs that could possibly start tiny,
enourmously expensive settlements of a few hundred glorified
vacationers.

Its often been suggested in the giant megathreads on the sf and
sci.space.policy newsgroups that we will have no commercial incentive
to go to space, so we won't; I'm not attempting to redredge that
argument. I however don't think there is much commercial incentive now
outside of the communications industry, and that it will be
unprofitable for a long time for a rational investor to put money into
most space programs.

I believe that as the economy grows and technology advances,
commercial space ventures will become affordable, but not for a long
time. Does anyone want to look into the crystal ball and see whether
space is still dominated by government prestige and defence programs
still by 2050?

Looking at previous postings (what will space exploration be like in
2050) about 5 years ago, where are we since then? It seems it was
mostly William Mook painting a pretty picture that I find a little
overoptimistic in the terms of commercial utility of space, and
criticisms of his projections. Still a fun read:

http://tinyurl.com/263ak

If we have no major wars, revolutions, or other like disruptions, we
can expect the global economy to be about 4 times larger than it is
currently, with the top economies being China, US, and India.

Much of the worlds economies will be geared for industrial production.
We may hit the singularity with AI development; or it may just be the
entire world buying better cars and having more leisure time. But at
some point commercial space travel will be affordable, if for no other
reason than the growth of economies to the point of indulgence on
whim.

So when will commercially viable settlement be affordable?

If the USA puts ten billion dollars per year into space colonies we will likely have small ones by 2050 = $490 billion, but we have to continue the other NASA programs as they help the related technology to improve. Part of the difficulty is lack of long term commitment. The other problem is we are fearful we will kill the colonists and excessive caution is expensive. Neil