>>12281178NGOs, especially corporations, lag behind the university system when it comes to scientific achievement. Lithium batteries, BSD Unix, ARPANET, the first wireless networks (ALOHANET), the first general-purpose computers, the current state-of-the-art cryptography, and thousands of other breakthroughs were achieved by research universities using government funds. The same is true in other fields, but I study CS, so I don't want to dunning-kruger myself.
There's an entire book about how the iPhone (allegedly the peak of private-sector innovation) is just a bunch of components developed by the public sector, shrunken slightly and repurposed for consoomers. IBM and other tech giants have similar histories --- take a breakthrough from a university, make minor changes, and market it to non-technical people. There's value in that, of course, but to compare it to actual breakthroughs is silly.
The government is better-equipped to handle other challenges as well. Much easier to enforce environmental regulations with fines and prison time than letter-writing campaigns. Likewise for health and safety standards, protecting human rights, and so on.
Don't get me wrong, corporations have their place. They're good at last-mile development of consumer goods, which is valuable in its own right. They're also (sometimes) better at handling logistical challenges, although I'd say the military gets first place in that field. But saying everything, or even most things, should be done by businesses is obviously misguided.
