Comment Ridley opposes state aid unless for himself (Score 5, Insightful) 248
There is an old adage; everyone hates government spending except the government spending they benefit from themselves. In this case, almost every article Matt Ridley writes says how bad state aid is. Except when he was head of a bank himself, when times were tough he went to parliament with his hat in his hand to beg for a taxpayer bailout and suddenly state aid was a great idea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Ridley#Northern_Rock
If you want to change Matt Ridley's mind about state spending on research, give him a job in a research lab and watch with wonder as articles praising state aid for research emanate from his greedy mind.