If only.... It's sad because it's not the scientists who get rich off of the advancements like cars, oil and pharmaceuticals but the business men.
Then these businesses hoard the money and resist change because they think they won't make money in the short term. For example electric cars are the future but very few car companies are producing any right now. It took Tesla coming into the picture to get the ball rolling.
Research for possible innovations in medicine don't get good funding because there might not be enough money to be made through that particular method.
Not to mention the vague and biased research like chocolate is healthy for you (funded by Hershey's) or milk=strong bones (funded by the dairy industry).
So many possible innovations but almost impossible to get funding because the rich only want to get richer. It's a breath of fresh air when someone like Elon Musk comes in and gets companies like Tesla and SpaceX going, without him who knows if we would be landing rockets by now.