Economic Justifications For Developing Space Infrastructure

John Lewis' book, Mining the Sky, gives a good review of that subject,
mining the sky. Energy seems like the only possibility for profits via
selling something on Earth from space in the near future. So, I am for
exploring that option, but still I wonder if this import-kind-of thinking
misses the mark.
The value of the Americas was not primarily what could be taken to Europe
and sold, but what we Americans now have here. Sometimes it is still called
the New World. We can have the same in Space. With global warming and
growing populations, humans need new habitats which offer the possibility of
industrial lifestyles. A third of the Earth's population live under
extremely deprived conditions, and if they consumed energy and materials at
the same rate that those of us with computers do the environments of Earth
would be in much worse shape. And I think it is going there. In space
there can be thousands, even millions, or billions, of new worlds. And the
people on such multiple worlds would not all die from one large asteroid
impact with Earth. What is the economic value of our species surviving?
The Moon is a logical outpost for sending energy to Earth via microwaves,
and for building materials for space infrastructure as outlined by G. K.
O'Neill in the 1970's. See The High Frontier, G. K. O'Neill, for example.
The Moon is a place to start. There may be others, but humans could live in
"mining towns" on the Moon, and on orbiting construction habitats. Tourism
now can help publicize those possibilities, maybe even help finance the
infrastructure. A Lunar Las Vegas, with golf courses, would be great! Of
course, all of the steps to achieve these exterrestrial outposts are not
clear, but neither were the details clear for the terrestrial colonization
efforts.
Although we should examine the history of colonization on Earth to see if
there are lessons that apply to space, I am skeptical and suspect few will.
Too many things, communications and transportation technologies, capital
markets, for examples, are just too different.
I hope these comments will be of interest. Sincerely, Jay Huebner