Welcome to the space policy edition of Planetary Radio. I'm Casey Dreyer, the Cheap of Space Policy Edition of Planetary Radio. I'm Casey Dreyer, the chief of space policy

here at the Planetary Society. We have a great guest this month. Akil Rao, who was for a brief

tenure, the chief economist at NASA, professor of economics, and specialized in a variety of economic

analyses for, I think, some pretty interesting things in space.

Akil's insights, particularly with orbital debris, as a similar analogy to how humans share limited and finite resources. His work has been connecting it to the idea of shared water resources

really helped spark this interesting discussion about the idea of analogy

and how value can be gained by applying the right type of analogies to areas that are pretty strange, you know,

space. But also, I think, a lot of the pitfalls possible with that. We also talk about perhaps

more relevantly the fact that his prior role at NASA now no longer exists. It was one of the

jobs that were ended by the incoming Trump administration, along with a number of other people providing independent analysis and insight for the administrator's office.

We talk about, again, the role of economists at NASA and ideally how they want to be used, this idea of saying, not no, this can't happen,

but how can something happen? Maybe if what NASA needs to do, if it really wants to rely on the

private sector to provide key services, do you have a healthy market? And we also have a nice discussion about the idea of who is forecasting the economic

futures of space and what some of those may have to gain from it.

Before we have that conversation, I want to first mention the fact that the Planetary

Society, my organization that is making this show you're listening to right now is a member-supported

independent organization. What does that mean? That means that we don't take government money.

That means we don't take big corporate money. The planetary society relies on individuals to exist.

That is a unique place to be, particularly these days, where we don't have to be shy about

voicing our concerns, but also voicing our passions for the things that we care about,

space science and exploration, planetary defense, the search for life.

We get to say what we believe in, because we are enabled by you and supporters

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