Monday, September 29, 2014

SpaceX in South Texas


During class, we discussed that Tesla motors is moving to Nevada bringing thousands of jobs bringing $100 billion in economic activity. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is taking his pribately owned SpaceX company to south Texas right at the mouth of the Rio Grande River. SpaceX’ vision as found on their website is “SpaceX designs, manufactures and launches advanced rockets and spacecraft. The company was founded in 2002 to revolutionize space technology, with the ultimate goal of enabling people to live on other planets.”


Photo Source: http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/spacex_default.jpg

Some key points from an article are provided below: 
SpaceX will be the first private commercial orbital launch facility in the world
Site will be operating by 2016 launching 12 flights per year
Texas offered $15 million in incentives
$80 million in improvements will be made to Boca Chica Beach
SpaceX will bring 300 direct jobs to the southwest border region
SpaceX already has a facility in central Texas that does rocket testing

The activity in this region will be extremely interesting to watch. With the 300 direct jobs serving private commercial orbital launches, it is safe to say that other additional nonbasic jobs will be added to the local economy. Additionally, tourism should be expected to increase. The article mentions the prevailing immigration issues in the region which bring connotation of regional/local decay and relatively poorer economic conditions. The attraction should bring positive effects to the region in the form of renewal, increased labor, and increased overall general market conditions. 

Article source: http://news.yahoo.com/spacex-breaks-ground-texas-orbital-launch-facility-194228703--finance.html#

http://www.spacex.com/

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