Antartica Experience
This is a good place to start understanding the psychology of a small group in a hostile environment with limited access to normal comforts. This is not a waste of money even if humanity never gets further than the moon.
Scientific research will show what is possible and what resources can be obtained from space exploration; but it will take a business venture to spend the money to get those resources. It would be easier to go to the asteroid belt for those resources, but the problem of surviving the journey, gathering and then returning those resources is still formidable. It is almost the same problem we had 600 years ago before the discovery of three new continents; the long journey by sail was arduous and expensive.
