Comments on: Road Shortage in Socialist Paradise

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:57:21 +0000

How come you’re sure they would build the road if allowed?

Their best offer has been a loan… a deal in which over time the government pays them for the privilege of increasing their business. I would love to loan you some money so that you can increase traffic to my website. I will give you 10 dollars now to promote my blog on ten other webpages. In exchange, I will allow you to give me 11 dollars on Friday. This is the kind of deal that the government is refusing. I would find this argument much more compelling if the store offered to pay for the road. If the government refused, then we might be showing a real point.

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:52:06 +0000

That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. Presumably, if they are willing to commute through bad traffic to one remote store, they would be willing to commute through less bad traffic to another remote store.

By: Anders Mikkelsen

Anders Mikkelsen — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:48:31 +0000

What I like is “Private interests are generally not allowed to participate in the provision of public welfare and service.” Who then could determine the provisioning? On what basis could they act.

The problem is that the store has no way to increase the road capacity in their area. They even tried loaning money. I am sure they would build the road too if allowed, it would increase the value of their land. In the US private people build the roads all the time (of course they’re taken over by the government.) It is true that getting the government to build the road is a subsidy.

A system where “Private interests are generally not allowed to participate in the provision of public welfare and service.” will be even more illogical than a system where they do determine provision of state services. Which is why the free market is the best system for provision of public welfare and service.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 20:45:59 +0000

That would be too “RSVP” for government.

Since when do they act according to people’s demand?

By: ProfNickD

ProfNickD — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 19:27:56 +0000

Rory,

I’m sure that the grocery store chain is paying highway-robber levels of taxation — should it not have these taxes refunded to it, thereby enabling it to build the road and avoiding the subsidy issue?

By: El Tonno

El Tonno — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 12:11:49 +0000

With that state of mind, it would be impossible to complain about anything. Actually, you would need to have perfect knowledge of local, even future conditions at the moment you plan your business move. That is illusory.

In the Real World, businesses start, then maybe grow, then quite probably hit some problem along the road to success. This problem may be solvable [road gets improved] or it may not [refusal of the road monopolist to improve road], so at that point lateral thinking may be needed [move store, open branches].

By: J. Murray

J. Murray — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 12:05:39 +0000

The communities that people commute from are too small to support additional stores.

By: J. Murray

J. Murray — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 12:02:39 +0000

If a private road operator was offered a loan at below market rates to expand on a service that brought that volume of customers, they wouldn’t even be holding a discussion. They would have road crews out and saying, “We start digging when that cash hits our accounts.”

By: V

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 03:03:03 +0000

If I start a business in Uganda, complaining about the lack of security and the government roads is BS. You know what you’re getting into ahead of time. I really don’t have sympathy for this store. They underestimated the rigidness of the local government. They made a poor business decision.

Business decisions should be made under the assumption of how government actually works not how it ought to work. If anything, the business should have negotiated the road contracts way before opening. This is just sloppy.

Furthermore, yes the state is responsible for building roads. But a business is responsible for its own decisions. Don’t start a business where you might have to rely on an unreliable government.

By: Ben

Ben — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 02:31:37 +0000

The issue is that the state controls construction of the roads. I’m sure that the store would be willing to pay for it, but the state will have none of that. What do you think would happen if the store simply hired a large construction company to just expand the existing road? I can see it now, construction workers being arrested for improving the roads because the state refuses to.

By: Joe

Joe — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 01:36:38 +0000

Just as the skyway out of Chicago was privatized? These are as private as the electric or gas companies. Just because private companies are anointed property by the statist politicians just means someone is getting their hands greased… At least this is the case from my planet

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 22:05:28 +0000

if the majority of swedish roads are private then the criticism seems even less relevant. there must be companies capable of building and maintaining roads. the store should hire them to build alternative routes… where is the issue? the more i see from the comments, the more this looks like someone trying to misappropriate libertarianism in favor of socialist handouts for a favored business.

By: Per Bylund

Per Bylund — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 21:52:28 +0000

Funny thing, Rory, the great majority of Swedish roads are actually private (!); I’ve heard it is between 80 and 90%. But the larger roads (which one would think “easier” to finance privately) are exclusively state-run and state-owned. So there is an interesting very Swedish twist to this.

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:47:12 +0000

On a more productive line of inquiry, are there any places where road construction/management is largely privatized? this anecdote doesnt seem to point to anything particular to sweden, but rather a shared trait of every country i can think of. when villainizing swedish socialism, it might be proper to pick some aspect that is more… swedish

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:04:18 +0000

an alternative free market solution to this “problem” would be to OPEN ANOTHER BRANCH. you know, somewhere where there are people. its entirely possible that the same solution would be the best one in a stateless society. that way libertarians dont have to argue that its appropriate for the government to step in in this situation. alternatively, we could consider a free market response where the store offers to pay for the road to be improved… you know, buying what it wants rather than asking for a handout, but that doesnt seem to be on the table. you shouldnt abandon your values because the world is imperfect. you should find ways to apply them in the imperfect world. i just offered two.

By: Captain Anarchy

Captain Anarchy — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 18:31:21 +0000

The point is that if the building of roads were not monopolized by government, this would not be a problem. In a stateless free market society, there would be a multitude of competing road construction and operation firms willing to bargain with Gekås. Because they have to compete and they have pricing signals from the market, the price would necessarily be lower, and the road would have likely been built to appropriate size years prior.

By: Stan Kwiatkowski

Stan Kwiatkowski — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 18:23:57 +0000

no, the point is that what is happening in Sweden contradicts what is explicitly said about the wonders of the Swedish state.

By: Huebert

Huebert — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 18:23:53 +0000

If the government is going to monopolize the creation of roads, it’s not unreasonable or unlibertarian to complain when those roads are inadequate. Am I not allowed to grumble when the streets where I live are full of potholes? Can I not be happy if they’re then fixed? I do pay taxes supposedly to fund these things, after all.

Also, I don’t favor subsidies to anyone, but here improving the road would not simply be a subsidy to the business; it would also be a subsidy to the consumers who want to go to that business. And while I know nothing of this particular business, it’s hard to imagine that it is not a net tax payer by a large margin, so it’s not so terribly outrageous to want a little something back, particularly something the government claims as one of its primary responsibilities.

By: Rory Carmichael

Rory Carmichael — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 18:12:33 +0000

the key aspect of a loan is that you pay it back. if the government takes a loan to do something, they still pay to do it eventually. government paying to do something for a business=subsidy

By: M.R. Orlowski

M.R. Orlowski — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 18:03:06 +0000

The retailer offered to loan the government money to build infrastructure leading to its store and the government has not responded as of yet, how is that being “subsidized?”