As far as adding value (and therefore commanding a better hourly rate) the "cert du jour" is arguably the PMP (Project Management Professional) from the Project Management Institute.

As the recently popularized joke goes:

Q: What does and engineer call a PMP?

A: Boss.

Of course, YMMV ...

"... we are long, long years away from any sort of "cruise ship in space" experience."

Well ... depending on how you define that phrase, perhaps not as long as you imply.

Just a bit of Googling illustrates the fact that an orbital "hotel" (okay, perhaps more like a rented office space available on a month-to-month lease) capable of hosting a dozen people at a time is at most five years away. (Bigelow Aerospace)

Once there is a commercial capsule available for transport (SpaceX, three years), and a habitable destination available for stays of weeks at a time for mere millions of dollars per person, then the phrase "cruise ship in space" starts to sound less and less ridiculous.

Based on current projections from SpaceX and Bigelow, some cocktail napkin figures would probably place a week in space at an "orbiting hotel" in the range of about $15M per visitor.

Definitely in the realm of "billionaire tourist", but already being regularly snapped-up at a higher price than that via Space Adventures, Inc. In fact, it is widely known there is more demand than capacity for such trips NOW, due to the limited access at the ISS.

However, this calculation ignores the fact that with potentially hundreds of launches per year, costs will be reduced significantly. There indeed will be economies of scale in the commercial space industry.

In just one example, such a destination could easily spur development of a large passenger module for the Falcon Heavy rocket, which could potentially transport dozens of people per launch (estimated at $120M). In addition, larger Bigelow stations to host more people are not simply a possibility, they are already in the plan.

It is not a stretch to imagine costs for a week in space coming down into the range of "several million dollars" within a decade, in which case the market opens to quite a large number of people.

I, for one, welcome our new commercial space overlords.

"You see, to be quite frank, Kevin, the fabric of the universe is far from perfect. It was a bit of botched job, you see. We only had seven days to make it."

OMNI rocked in all the ways that matter.

As mentioned, the sci-fi, the science, the palpable sensuality of it's envisioned future ... it was the death of OMNI which led me to seek solace in the emergent WIRED. For a time, it was a suitable heir.

And the death of WIRED (just try and argue that it ain't) has led me ... nowhere.

I'd gladly pay $36 a year for a worthy successor to either one.