As much as we may want to know what lies beyond our earth, there are bigger issues that our government must address. More people are affected by poverty than by space. The government must focus their resources and efforts to one problem at a time, and with a third of the UK living under the ‘poverty line’ more money should be spent helping the poor, rather than on space research. If the government doesn 't handle the economic crisis with care, we will all end up poor – but to treat the situation properly requires more funding. The government have this funding, but it is wasted on space research. Imagine you own a house, and over the years many parts have become ruined, but despite having the money to fix these problems, it has never been fixed. …show more content…
According to UNICEF, 22,000 children alone die every day due to poverty, but yet the money that could save a majority is spent on space missions, which often fail. Scientists lost contact with the Mars Polar Lander, an unmanned spacecraft sent to Mars in 1999, which cost $110 million, and the Mars Climate Orbiter mission also failed, after an almost embarrassing mix up of metric and imperial measurements, a waste of $125 million. Why do we continue to waste money on space travel, when we know how many children die each day? Why do we continue to ignore the problem of poverty to fund research in space? Why do we let so many children …show more content…
In 2009, almost a fifth of the UK population were living in a household within the low income threshold. Poverty is all around us - we only have to step into the streets to see someone begging for money, begging for help. In late 2012, Chancellor George Osbourne announced that there would be increased spending on space technology by £120 million over the following two years - which has very little direct benefit to most of the UK. It is unfair for space technology to become more important to the government than caring for those most in need! It is unfair to ignore a THIRD of the world 's population! It is unfair that those so close to home are neglected for the sake of something so far