Economists, business leaders and space policy experts discussed how space can drive economic growth on Earth, calling for more business leaders and companies to engage with the “space economy” at the Elliott School of International Affairs on Tuesday.
Four panelists discussed the growing commercialization of space and how it will impact the Earth’s economy, as well as the 2025 book “Space to Grow: Unlocking the Final Economic Frontier,” which combines ideas of space technology with economics to envision space as the next major arena for economic growth. The Elliott school’s Space Policy Institute hosted the event, moderated by Scott Pace, the SPI director and professor of the practice of international affairs.
Matthew Weinzierl, a professor of business administration at Harvard Business School and co-author of the book, said space is “just another place,” meaning the same dynamics economists analyze on Earth, like supply and demand and relationships between companies, remain consistent despite the absence of gravity and a breathable atmosphere.
“We don’t want to think of ourselves as space economists, we’re economists that use space as a place to ask some of the big questions,” Weinzierl said.
Weinzierl said he hopes the book, which serves partially as a basic introduction to the space sector, is a “call to action” for business leaders to become interested in space. He said he is unsure what the future of space travel and technology will look like, but hopes it will incorporate “really big ambitions,” pioneering technology like asteroid mining — a proposed approach to extract valuable minerals from passing asteroids — and commercialized space travel.
“There’s something special about space that lights the imagination on fire,” Weinzierl said. “And so I feel like there will be a persistent supply of people and talent and capital to space.”
Brendan Rosseau, an orbital launch strategy manager at space technology company Blue Origin and the book’s co-author, said the “biggest change” in the space sector over the past 25 years is the introduction of “market forces,” with private investment and corporations replacing governments as the primary source of funding. He said private businesses will drive efficiency and innovation in the industry, because they are more focused than government actors on profit and economic viability.
Rosseau said the set of “space activities” governments and companies are pursuing today, which he said are primarily in communication infrastructure, does not reflect the “full set of ways” space can be valuable, like further pursuing space-based solar power, data centers in space and asteroid mining. He said these developing technologies could offer new solutions to challenges on Earth, like energy and resource shortages.
“There’s a whole set of companies and programs that are going after that big game in space, things that could potentially be a step change in how we think about space and the ways that we use it to drive benefit for us,” Rosseau said.
Rosseau said most “normal companies” do not naturally pursue space services like satellites or data centers, since they fall outside their growth strategy and must be repeatedly pitched by industry professionals to attract interest. He said there is a “huge amount” of opportunity for businesses to invest in space to develop technology and help “build a world that we are excited about.”
“I feel lucky to be at a period now where it feels closer to the beginning of this story than the end,” Rosseau said. “It’s still kind of uncertain and maybe a little bit risky, but for my money, that’s where I want to be.”
Clay Mowry, the CEO of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, said commercial space companies have “dramatically” reduced the cost of launching satellites into orbit by scaling up production with reusable spacecraft and releasing dozens of satellites at a time, a more cost-effective approach compared to traditional single-use rockets and one-satellite missions.
“It wasn’t able to grow beyond its kind of limited scope, and no one was able to scale in the business,” Mowry said. “So if you launch 10 times a year, that was a lot right? SpaceX is about to launch 200 times this year.”
Mowry said he thinks the space industry is at the “front edge” of innovation with technologies like satellite internet and space solar power, and that young entrepreneurs are developing new technologies “in a garage somewhere” that even space industry experts cannot predict.
“It’s the most exciting time for me in 30 years in space, but I think we’re just at the tip of the iceberg because we’re seeing some of this technology innovation,” Mowry said. “We’re seeing scale finally in our business, which we never had before.”
Tina Highfill, a research economist at the Bureau of Economic Analysis, said the United States space economy contributes “about half a percent” to the country’s total gross domestic product. She said it “sounds like a small number,” but the entire U.S. agricultural industry is also less than one percent.
“The space economy kind of transcends standard industry,” Highfill said. “So it’s not just manufacturing, it’s not just government. There’s construction of space ports, there’s R&D, there’s satellite television information.”
Highfill said the BEA found that the space economy is growing, but not as fast compared to the rest of the U.S. economy, with the largest drivers of growth being inflation and national defense spending. She said although space companies are innovative, they have difficulty mass-marketing their technological services because everyday consumers and businesses do not find them useful or cannot afford them.
“Maybe the messaging needs to change, or there needs to be some mechanism to grow that demand amongst consumers,” Highfill said. “Because I think the suppliers are ready to make it happen, but there just doesn’t seem to be the demand there.”
