) **China is going to land on the moon by 2030.** That’s not some distant dream, that’s just a very few short years from now. A month after Jared Isaacman’s withdrawal as potential NASA administrator, my friend Casey Handmer, who used to work at NASA, published a blog post titled “[NASA is Worth Saving](https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2025/06/12/nasa-is-worth-saving/).” In the essay, Casey argued that NASA, despite its problems, still represents something we Americans shouldn’t give up on. Casey worked at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab for four years, developing software for passive GPS-based radar systems used to study Earth and the moon. As a result, Casey’s intimately familiar with NASA’s bureaucracy and its fail points. So when he calls NASA out, he speaks from having walked the corridors and from working directly in the agency. So, how can we save NASA? And… _should we?_ But first! _A word from our sponsor:_ > NASA was built by people who believed in impossible missions. [E1 ventures](https://e1.vc/) backs that same kind of founder today — the ones pushing the edge of what’s possible in science and tech. > > If you’re building something bold and looking for investors dedicated to backing your vision and journey, reach out to E1 today. > >  ### NASA Is About to Lose the Second Space Race to China > We’re now in a situation where NASA, whose only purpose is to safeguard US strategic interests in space, is going to lose badly a war to put astronauts on the moon before China does, whose intentions in this matter have been the opposite of secret since 2006. > > It is no longer possible to fix this gently. It is no longer possible to fix this with an update of a couple of rules here and there. It’s going to need extremely drastic surgery to save the patient at this point. > > It is important that the United States essentially keep Chinese extraterritorial ambitions in their place. And that’s not because Chinese are Chinese people. It’s because the Chinese people are ruled by an autocratic dictatorship that stomps on the face of human freedom and decency. We should be open and honest about that fact. And it’s just as pressing as the Soviets with Sputnik. And we realized like we’re about to get stomped here by a largely medieval run system. > > _Casey_ So… how did we get here? > NASA is obviously a storied institution and it has many glorious successes and some pretty gut-wrenching failures in its past. It’s a place I’ve worked for four years. I regard myself as privileged and honored to have worked there, to be part of that story. > > Like pretty much everyone in the space community, I was enormously hopeful about Jared Isaacman’s nomination as NASA administrator, because like most people in the space community, I was kind of painfully aware of the existential problems facing NASA in its current incarnation. And you can ask yourself the question, what would it take for the United States to have US astronauts on the moon by 2030? NASA or no NASA, quite a long series of miracles would have to occur. That’s kind of strange. > > It’s been more than 50 years since we went the first time. It doesn’t seem we’re any better at it than we were before. If anything, we’re worse. > > We retired the space shuttle more than 10 years ago and they haven’t launched people into space on a NASA built spacecraft since. I think most taxpayers do expect that $20 billion a year should buy them a space program that defends their interest in space. And previously you could kind of wave your hands and say, well, it doesn’t matter all that much. It’s only $20 billion a year. It’s not as important as the war in Iraq. It’s not as important as reforming Medicare or whatever. > > _Casey_ China’s National Space Administration, the CNSA, has pledged to land on the moon by 2030. And in my opinion, their progress supports that timeline. They’ve been running a very successful space program for a long time and their Long March 10 rocket is making incredible progress. Meanwhile, NASA’s SLS program, the program meant to take us back to the moon, is years behind schedule, tens of billions of dollars over budget, and doesn’t work properly. **NASA, and America, is about to lose the second space race to China.**  ### How NASA Lost Its Way: What the Numbers Say About NASA’s Decline So here’s what the data says: Artemis 1 ran about [$6 billion over budget and counting](https://www.space.com/nasa-sls-megarocket-cost-delays-report?utm_source=chatgpt.com). The government’s accountability office or GAO says [NASA still can’t reliably track costs for Artemis 2 or 3](https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-23-105609.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com), meaning even NASA doesn’t know what its flagship launch project even costs. [Nearly 80 cents of every NASA dollar goes to contractors like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman](https://www.planetary.org/space-policy/nasa-budget?utm_source=chatgpt.com), leaving little for in-house engineering. And the cost gap is staggering. [NASA’s SLS rockets cost more than $4 billion per launch](https://www.space.com/nasa-sls-rocket-artemis-moon-plans-unaffordable-gao-report?utm_source=chatgpt.com), while [SpaceX Falcon Heavy costs around $150 million](https://spaceinsider.tech/2023/08/16/how-much-does-it-cost-to-launch-a-rocket/?utm_source=chatgpt.com). Granted, they’re two very different classes of vehicles, but with Starship slowly coming online, that’s a big cost difference. But even Starship and [Blue Origin’s New Glenn don’t cost $4 billion per launch](https://www.fool.com/investing/2025/01/22/blue-origin-new-glenn-is-a-big-deal-for-amazon/?utm_source=chatgpt.com). In the 60s, the [Apollo program cost around $50 billion](https://www.planetary.org/space-policy/cost-of-apollo?utm_source=chatgpt.com) in today’s dollars and delivered six moon landings. [Artemis has already crossed $90 billion](https://oig.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/IG-22-011.pdf?utm_source=chatgpt.com) and hasn’t landed on the moon once. Even NASA’s own [employee surveys](https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/2024-annual-employee-survey-aes-results.pdf?emrc=671a24c795b88&utm_source=chatgpt.com) show morale and innovation falling below federal averages. Federal averages, that’s not even private averages. When your [budget drops from 3% of federal spending to less than half a percent](https://ballotpedia.org/Fact_check/Is_NASA%27s_budget_less_than_2_percent_of_the_federal_budget?utm_source=chatgpt.com), but your bureaucracy stays the same, something has to give. _Either you reinvent the system or you slowly fall behind._ > Just for context, the Manhattan Project, which was operated in the middle of World War II, almost 80 years ago, with vastly inferior technology and overall knowledge against a backdrop of severe resource shortages and scarcity, in the midst of a hot war where hundreds of thousands of US people and millions of allies were dying, managed to go from like, we think uranium can do this, to a functional weapon in three years at an expense of $10 billion a year in modern money. > > It’s completely reasonable for me and for other commentators to say, no, we are spending $20 billion a year. I expect to see $20 billion a year of productivity and output. Why the hell are we building a space launch system around a bunch of parts that didn’t work properly on the space shuttle in the first place? And whose designers are not only retired, but long dead. > > It’s not like we’ve forgotten how to make smart people. It’s not like SpaceX was unable to design a Falcon rocket because they couldn’t find someone who could competently design a rocket using modern materials and technology. And so for $20 billion a year, it should be easy for them to build a moon rocket from scratch in three years. > > It’s not that we’re not even close to that. It’s like it’s in a completely different universe. I think the greatest sin of NASA is not that there’s some fundamental problem with the workforce, although obviously there are some people there who are probably in the wrong jobs. > > It’s just that their ability to be incentivized to be highly productive is completely destroyed. On five separate occasions, I was formally reprimanded for committing the cardinal error of committing to writing some way I’d found of saving money. And I was told not only, _no thanks_, but— _please stop_. > > _Casey_ So what happened? Why is NASA less effective now than it was in the sixties? > Part of the reason that things are as dire as they are is that the existing constituencies like them that way. And this is not a joke. I have friends who are former NASA officials who’ve been prosecuted for crimes they did not commit because they got in the way of various powerful contractors getting their cut. Yeah, don’t fool yourself. This can happen. > > Part of the issue with all federal agencies over time, they accumulate more and more rules and regulations and scar tissue and so on in bureaucracy. The space shuttle had hundreds of people working on mission insurance who basically signed the death warrant of seven astronauts at the Columbia disaster because what they learned from the Challenger disaster, they needed to have mission insurance office. And the mission assurance office just became the mechanism by which they laundered this catastrophically unsafe system to get to yes on launching it again and again and again until luck ran out. When it comes to talent management, there’s plenty of really smart people at NASA. > > My experience there dealing with their recruiting function was the entire building full of recruiters basically indifferent to ever doing their jobs correctly. And I knew people who were working as group supervisors who would tear their hair out in frustration because NASA rules prohibit them from reaching out directly to a candidate. They have to go through the recruiter to justify the recruiter’s existence. > > They’re an organization that cannot hire competitively. They can’t offer competitive salary and even their recruiting process can’t work properly. But also that refuses to fire anyone under any circumstances whatsoever for incompetence. It’s hardly a surprise that like NASA is basically full of people who have learned helplessness. > > _Casey_ ### NASA’s Identity Crisis While Casey talks about NASA’s culture, there’s a quieter structural shift underway that could change everything about how NASA operates. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, currently acting NASA head, has [reportedly floated folding NASA into the Department of Transportation](https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/musk-nasa-chief-duffy-jostle-over-space-agency-leadership-2025-10-22/?utm_source=chatgpt.com), turning an exploration agency into a logistics bureau. [The Pentagon now outspends NASA 5 to 1 in space](https://www.saffm.hq.af.mil/FM-Resources/Budget/Air-Force-Presidents-Budget-FY25/?utm_source=chatgpt.com), quietly becoming America’s dominant space agency. Building faster, launching more often, and defining the frontier through a military lens. [Every US astronaut since 2020 has launched on a privately built SpaceX rocket](https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-astronauts-launch-from-america-in-historic-test-flight-of-spacex-crew-dragon/?utm_source=chatgpt.com). Ironically, NASA’s most successful programs, Commercial Crew and Commercial Lander, are the ones that doesn’t even run directly. But politics keep rewriting the mission. Constellation, then Orion, then Artemis. You can’t build a 20-year plan with a four-year attention span. So NASA faces an identity crisis: Is it a science agency, a military partner, or a government shipping department? **Because if it can’t decide what it is, someone else will.** > Yeah, there are some people in the space community who think that really NASA is so far past its peak and so moribund that it should probably just be wound down and a new space exploration agency should be set up. Or maybe Congress should just give SpaceX or Blue Origin a big pile of cash and have them go and do it. And I thought, no, I think NASA’s brand and what it stands for is worthwhile enough that it’s worth going to the effort of saving it. > > And more importantly, kind of upholds the promise that I think is implicit in the last page of the US passport, which is that the US has an interest in space and that US technology and wealth will uphold the dream and promise of human freedom throughout the universe forever. If China ends up building some kind of permanent base on the lunar South Pole, there’s a pretty good chance they’ll say, well, you have Taiwan and we have the South Pole and we have nuclear weapons. If you want to disagree, well, good luck. > > _Casey_ Casey claims that NASA has become inefficient. And isn’t doing a good job at defending the interests of the American people in space. **So, should we just blow up NASA and start from scratch?** And if not: _how can we save it?_ > It’s not like we have to invent this from scratch. We just have to look at other organizations that have retained effectiveness or currently have effectiveness. I think the most obvious thing is like free coffee. Have you ever seen an organization that’s serious about success that like charges people for coffee? That’s ridiculous. > > It’s long past time that the core deep space exploration functions were organized around products rather than around functions and competencies. Simply because that simplifies workforce management for one thing. So you kind of go away from this idea that like the major challenge of all the supervisors is to ensure that like every one of their employees is a charge number they can charge their time to at all times. > > One of the strange things is since 2015, when SpaceX first landed the Falcon, we’ve basically been in a situation of post-scarcity with regards to launch. Like there’s never been a situation where NASA couldn’t get their payload on a rocket because one of the launch contractors didn’t have a rocket available. I think SpaceX just passed their 100th launch for the year. So there’s no shortage of rockets going up. And so you say, well, we have these decadal surveys of big questions we want to burn down on the science side. Why don’t we just figure out how to put our instruments on five, 10, 15, 20 different relatively inexpensive spacecraft buses and launch them in a serial fashion? We don’t have to do these like giant Battlestar Galactica style missions that we did in the 1980s anymore. We have miniaturized electronics, cell phones, for example. And the people say we can’t do that in deep space. That’s garbage. The Mars helicopter runs a cell phone processor and it worked just fine. > > It’s a funny thing, right? It’s like, don’t look up, right? It’s this kind of slow burning fuse because 1,570 days is a long time away, but rockets are not all that quick to build. If humans get back to the moon, on the surface of the moon, it’ll be probably on a Starship anyway. If NASA was appropriately aligned around moon and Mars and a handful of other missions, that they could make significant progress, right? And they could significantly speed up all the ancillary things that SpaceX will also have to do to build a moon base, for example, and maybe shave a year or two off the schedule. > > All I’m asking is align the incentives between all the different operators so that the people working at NASA, working on projects that they can understand and dream about and feel proud getting up at five o’clock in the morning to grind on for years, years necessary to make this happen and show that the US system is still the best way of organizing people and running an economy and allowing people the freedom of vote and control of their leaders and so on. And really kind of open out a wide future so that the kids who are in school right now can look at NASA and be like, ‘Oh, that would be the best place I could possibly imagine to go work!’ As opposed to… ‘Never heard of it.’ > > _Casey_ ### A Chance to Save It Almost one year ago, the space community, myself included, got pretty excited about [President Trump’s nomination of Jared Isaacman as NASA administrator](https://apnews.com/article/jared-isaacman-nasa-administrator-elon-musk-fb4662fac78ed7cecc25e4cdfb6ae46e). This was so exciting because everybody who works in the space industry knows just how **pedigreed, hardworking, and visionary Isaacman has been**. He’s qualified for the job, has deep relationships with other new space companies, and is all around a very optimistic, positive, and future-facing guy. So when [Trump withdrew Isaacman’s nomination on May 31st of 2025](https://apnews.com/article/trump-isaacman-nasa-nomination-withdraw-a0b1d23823a06ac7ae1994c930c7786c), we were all pretty disappointed and frankly concerned about what the future of NASA now may look like without Isaacman. Casey wrote his article shortly after Isaacman’s nomination was withdrawn, perhaps in response to it. _But in a shocking turn of events,_ [_President Trump has re-nominated Jared Isaacman to head NASA_](https://www.reuters.com/science/trump-nominates-musk-ally-jared-isaacman-position-nasa-chief-2025-11-04/?utm_source=chatgpt.com)_._ NASA is more than just another federal agency. Like Casey said, it embodies the US ideals of optimism, technical excellence, and the best of American spirit. **NASA is a symbol, an icon, a beacon of light that offers hope in a sometimes very dark world.** And like the Statue of Liberty or the Parthenon, it’s a reminder of what we can achieve when we dream boldly and work together. We should continue investing in it and expect more efficient results. **We should protect it and above all, never give up on it.** It’s an interesting time. Should we fix NASA? Should NASA just give all of its money to private industry, which is a big thing a lot of people call for? We’re really curious to hear what you think in the comments about this. _Until next time, thanks for watching and keep on building the future._ _–Jason_ P.S. If you enjoyed this and love space, check out our Frontier Film [[New Space]]