universal healthcare

[--Pete]

Hi,

It looks like the feds supply about $42 billion, out of a pool of $397 billion.

That's research and development. So money spent to make a vacuum cleaner lighter, or mascara thicker, or insoles softer all count. Basically anything that any company writes off as R&D is included in that figure. The further back you go from putting a product on the shelf, the more the research is funded by the government. I've often wondered if the government could have funded the nation if it had the power to patent the results of the products developed because of its research and charge reasonable royalties for the use of those patents.

I might be more of an optimist than you are. :)

I should hope so, if you're an optimist at all. I'm a realist. Or, more precisely, as I've said before, "I'm a cynical optimistic realist. I have hopes. I suspect they are all in vain. I find a lot of humor in that." (thank you NuurAbSaal for preserving that:))

--Pete