The rock group RUSH did a song about a launch of the Columbia space shuttle back in the day:
“This magic day when super-science
Mingles with the bright stuff of dreams”
While we do get a lot of concrete benefits from space exploration, I think that there is a huge benefit as well to being able to dream big things and having the opportunity to do them.
And while your son is fortunate to work with NASA, just think of all the other people that started off “wanting to be an astronaut”, got interested in science, and our now in the tech industry, engineers, medicine, etc.
Funny thing is, he never wanted to be an astronaut. When he was five he told my wife he wanted to work at NASA and build rockets.