Reason Foundation

That's from Burt Rutan, and he should know. When we ask a child, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" a fairly common response is "astronaut." Fifty years ago no child would offer such a response because astronauts didn't exist. Twenty-five years ago, adults might chuckle at a youngster with such a goal–after all, only the tiniest slice of the population ever traveled into space. But as more companies move toward manned space travel, it is not far-fetched for today's children to hope to be astronauts.