Forget that trillion-dollar price tag — Moon-Mars Tab Could Hit $100 Billion.
A hundred billion? Over fifteen years? Assuming those are present-value dollars, that would be an annual average budget of a mere $6.7 billion…a bit less than half of NASA’s current budget and a bit more than what the Shuttle program ordinarily runs. The article suggests that the figure already includes a 45% historical average cost overrun, but even at $1445 billion over fifteen years it hardly seems to be a budget-buster, does it?
Thomas, you might want to read my analysis of the CBO report:
http://curmudgeons.blogspot.com/2004_09_01_curmudgeons_archive.html#109450708696538176
The report contains a number of caveats that make the conclusions somewhat suspect.