Only to the degree that businesses meet these new needs and values do they produce ideal investment. As Rand frequently pointed out, there is no intrinsic ideal in any field, because there is no such thing as intrinsic value. Value is that which men choose to gain or keep. Today more men choose CD players and the science that supports them. Yesterday they chose tape decks and the science that supported them.
Tape decks are still available, but are losing market share to the new recordable CDs.
There's nothing like the scare of disaster to get Congress to toss up more tax-funded investment salad. The continuing NASA and academic catastrophe-cries about impending global warming are excellent examples. As calmer scientists debunk one NASA claim, NASA and friends fling two or three more out for the media's eager consumption. While there are exceptions, such as in some segments of computer science, the glut is widespread. While probably temporary, it nevertheless ranges over many fields, from mathematics to astronomy to nuclear physics to research biology.