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Access to space is incredibly expensive; There are no known natural resources (materials) out there that is worth the cost of transport. Even if you find an asteroid made of solid platinum, a trip to retrieve it wouldn't be profitable.

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Building aircraft carriers is also incredibly expensive, yet the government pays for it and it provides a lot of good jobs, and people feel that in the end it's necessary.

If the will were there, the expense would mean nothing. To a 16th century European, colonizing Arizona or Nevada, not to mention the South Pole, would have seemed as impossible as going to Mars and living there. Yet it happened because there was a will to expand into new territories. Similarly I think eventually the will to colonize the Solar System will outweigh the short-sighted analysis of everything based on some abstract idea of "cost". The need for concentrated energy sources will eventually lead to mining the Moon's He3 when it becomes generally understood that fossil fuels are being exhausted and alternatives are mandatory. That will be the real kick-off point.

-drl

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