I can't read the article, but I think evidence like this is important when it comes to the whole idea of government subsidises impacting on free markets. The free market has become a bit of a religion for some (you can see in the comments here), and there's this staunch divide between those that believe the free market will always come up with a humanitarian solution, to those that believe the government need to push things for it to happen.<p>My FIL was head of a large coal plant in the UK, and is very critical of renewable energies, their cost, the impact on the fossil fuel industry etc... It simply isn't possible to have a conversation with him about global warming - he will simultaneously argue it isn't happening and it's natural and not caused by us. He might be an extreme example, but there is general scepticism of government subsidies here.<p>I'd love to see a study where researchers take things that are seen as good/important/essential to modern life and measure the amount of public/government sponsorship that helped bring it about.