I don't think mapping analogies like this make for effective rational arguments. You could take any number of military technologies and argue how they wouldn't be possible in a market that was based on individual consumer demand. Government subsidies are the combined demands of the masses. It's a model of efficiency of scale. Sometimes it's applicable, sometimes it is not. Also, sometimes efficiency isn't the primary goal anyway. IMHO it's a tired false choice that government and private solutions are inherently effective or not. Consider the problem that needs to be solved, and devise a solution that speaks to the problem at hand, not another problem. Private enterprise makes for pencils. OK, we've solved the pencil problem. Let's keep that in mind as we go forward, but let's not start considering everything to be a pencil.