Since when did privatization become a bad thing?

I don't understand why the left hates privatization so much. The left hates oppressive government regimes right? So why not deregulate things a bit? I don't see what people couldn't accomplish that the state could. I just don't understand really why a lot of so called leftists are statists who want bigger government. It doesn't make sense.

I am with you I dont get it. All I hear on ATS is how corporations are the devil and we should give most of our money to our benevolent government so that they can help us break the slave chains the corps put on us. What the heck?

[edit on 21-4-2009 by justsomeboreddude]

I agree. Everything that can be privatized, should be and that is everything except for the military. The left are opposed to privatization because there is no legal way to loot a private entity.


TheAssociate

Now how can your thinking be so politically incorrect? Do you not know that big daddy Uncle Sam knows what is best for you? We need to be controlled by all those intellectually superior progressives who want to spread government dependency and control into all areas of our lives, for our good of course. THEN everything will be fair, no winners or losers but all one happy state run collective with a few higher ‘equals’ of course; somebody has to tell the uninitiated how to think and how to act if there will be world peace. Just hand in your weapons like the good sheep in Britain and the Commonwealth did, because big daddy can’t have you resisting his good intentions, and you really don’t need them anyway as their just evil.

Relax, go back to sleep and drink your beers while watching your indoctrination programming for the new Obama Nation! We have EVERYTHING under our control. SLEEP……

Go ask the few municipalities that have "privatized" their water companies, and ask how well they like it. I read about one not too far from where I live. They are either on the verge, or have taken it back from the company, because the company was more concerned with maximizing profits, than keeping the water actually flowing.

reply to post by sir_chancealot


That's a problem... yes. But why would you want the evil government who puts flouride in water to keep doing what they're doing? Don't you see what I'm saying? I see your point-- but the government is the greater evil here.

reply to post by Frankidealist35


Why do you think it's a left-right question, first of all?

I'm left on social issues, right on economic ones--what pigeon hole do I go into?

Here's why I hate privatization: take a look at what the right did with the privatization of the military.

The army used to do its own laundry, deliver its own fuel, supplies, mail, and serve its own food. Under the Neocons, people like Dick Cheney (former CEO of Halliburton), the Bush crime syndicate (Carlyle Group), and Donald Rumsfeld decided to privatize all those support functions and gave out no-bid contracts to--you guessed it--Halliburton and Carlyle Group--and a gang of other corporate leachers.

These companies made a killing off of killing and Halliburton, now that it has grown fat as a tick sucking the taxpayer's blood off of these incredibly lucrative contracts (go see just how much a gallon the Pentagon was charged for fuel deliveries in Iraq), decided last year to leave the US and re-incorporate in Dubai, a tax haven and money launderer's paradise.

In the meantime, the army grunts were not given proper armored vehicles in Iraq and private security firms like Blackwater were paying their "contractors" in Iraq $100s of thousands of dollars a year for their tours. And then you had the (latest) VA hospital scandals--remember those about a year ago? Disabled vets parked in dank, mold-infested hospital rooms?

Are you mad yet? I sure am.



[edit on 22-4-2009 by gottago]

not too many words, but some questions ?

1) when was the last time you heard of the national grid being over-hauled or up-graded ?

2) Do privatization really brings down prices for essential services ? No..

3) Privatization will eventually merge into one big corporation, what have they ever done for you ? You bail them out, but you don't own them, yet profits gained from you are theirs.

4) Is there any actual oversight after privatization ?

5) privatize schools, and in no time, All teachers will be Mexicans teaching your kids English.

IF privatization is that fantastic, why not privatize the government, the police, the feds.. since all the reasons of Privatization sound's good. Not that the corporation and media doesn't really owns it now.

That's all I have time to think about these things.

[edit on 22-4-2009 by mobydog]

reply to post by sir_chancealot


Just curious is this privatization of the water utility is fully deregulated or partially deregulated? In CT they partially deregulated the power utility. Meaning the power was no longer operated by the government but it wasnt exactly left to the free market. The partial deregulation set up all of these little stipulations that prevented the companies from actually competing and investing in new technologies.

Partial deregulation is a scam by the governments in question to show the people what a bad idea deregulation is without actually allowing deregulation and privatization and to coerce the people into begging government to come take over the industry for their own perceived good. It's like setting a slave free into an alligator infested swamp so he'll see the horrors of freedom and come running back to the chains without ever actually setting him free.

Just making sure these people arent being fooled by the same game that CT is playing.

When there's only one company to choose from chances are you are not deregulated. It's like the illusion of all of these competing cable companies. Competing companies that are regulated to certain service areas to ensure there is no real competition. Again, in CT, when the phone company started trials to offer their own television service the state government sued them. Shouldnt it have been the cable companies that sued to block the competition? They very well would have if there really was honest free-market competition.

Just about anywhere in this country in just about any sector deregulation, privatization and the free-market is some sick illusion perpetuated by the lies of a government that only wants more of your property and more control over you.

The government is inept and corrupt. They can't run anything without ruining it. Private industry and a free market society is MUCH smarter than nationalization and the gov't running everything.

Night and day difference.

I'm for private most things I suppose... But I am not for the privatization of my liberties
etc..

I do think Healthcare is $#@$$#@$#@$@#$@# that is the only industry I would like to see the government execute the payment and negotiations for the largest pool in the country, have private entities compete with that. I received much better healthcare in NZ - MEX - multiples cheaper, faster - stay in / not good luck Chuck NEEEXXXXXXTTTTT...

The left believe one should pretend that all unequal people are in fact equal. Teaching and allowing the working class to assume they could be masters has undermined and corrupted our system of governmence.

It is not a conservative argument, the private sector generates wealth beyond the capability of government. Prior to the labelling of the "working class", government had no interference within the market.

Markets were free.

Universal suffrage and liberalisation of government institutions gave the masses an opinion, that was unjust and unwarranted.

Here a few of BIGGEST reasons why massive privatization is a bad thing:

1)Consolidation of national funds from the many to the few(which has already happened)

2)Political gains by corporations (which, by definition, is fascism)

3)No public oversight

4)Shady contracts (see haliburton, and just about every company that Bush and Cheney have their hands in)

If the mindset in this country was the same as it used to be; the mindset that made the US what it was a few years ago, then total privatization might work.

However, with the current corporate mindset of profit first, last and always, it won't.

The corporate mindset in the US used to be along the lines of "I'm going to make the best damn hammer anyone has ever seen. And if I make money doing it, so much the better."

Now it is: "I'm going to make hammers that will be just good enough, and I'm going to cut every corner I possibly can to make them as cheaply as possible, and sell them for as much as possible, so I can maximize my profit."

This leads to cheap crap hammers that just barely do the job, don't last long and have high defect rates.

Given this mindset (and the mindset that KBR used, that has resulted in how many deaths of US soldiers from electrocution?), then I for one am not a big fan of privatization of industries upon which the culture depends - health care, utilities, highways, schooling, etc.

The claim that full privatization of everything is the best possible approach is no more valid than the claim that full government control of everything is the best possible approach.

Keep in mind that top-dog corp types and top-dog gov't types are often the same people. So thinking that having one or the other have full control will be a panacea is dreaming.

I do believe the posters in this thread are misrepresenting capitalism with corporatism, to separate entities all together.

19th Century capitalism was independent and not associated to the government, the Industrial Revolution was created by private pioneers. The greatest expansion of wealth has occurred from the private sector, and yes, greed has resulted in certain cases but that is a product of human greed - not capitalism.

reply to post by Open_Minded Skeptic


That goes back to consumer education and experience. People should only buy so many crap hammers before they realize that for a few dollars more they can have a quality hammer that will last a lifetime and beyond. There will always be an idiot market who thinks that pack of 10 toothbrushes for $1 is a good deal even when all of the bristles fall out in a matter hours. Because theyre idiots government needs to protect them from themselves and punish a business who exploits their idiocy?

Call me cold but I dont think so. Some people will with time learn not to be idiots and other will be idiots until they die. Let free nature sort it out. We dont need to be subsidizing idiocy.

If I can sell a moron something worthless and profit without lying or misrepresenting my product then so be it. Ideally people will catch on and I'll lose most if not all of my business to the guy offering a better product at a reasonable price.

Because something is cheap doesnt mean it's a good deal and because is expensive doesnt mean it's better. Consumers need to stop being idiots.

To expand on the notion of "good enough" we are living with the "pretty good" problem now in most electronics and appliances and even cars. In a given tier of cost nearly every product is "pretty good" with no real standouts. If the consumer has made it this far they can pretty much decide on aesthetics or some other superficial quality and still end up with a "pretty good" product. This forces the manufacturers to innovate or die. Some will innovate and we'll all get better products for less. Others will invest in marketing and try to push the same product in a new way. Both of these approaches will work in the short term but only one will survive the educated consumers scrutiny.

[edit on 22-4-2009 by thisguyrighthere]

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


And in the hammer industry this model works fine. But if we have some cheap crap electrical distribution system, and it is the only game in town, then to whom does a consumer turn?


The problem all boils down to human greed, I think. To think that either the corporate model or the government model is inherently 'better' than the other is just moving the problem, not solving it.

Total gov't control has tended to lead to incompetence and corruption. The current welfare setup is a prime example of this.

Total private control has tended to lead to incompetence and corruption. The issue with KBR killing off US soldiers is a prime example of this.

Full gov't control and full private control have both been proven to fail when most needed. We need a new model that combines the best of gov't and private control (keeping in mind speaking here of the industries upon which the culture depends, not the hammer or toothbrush industries), and constrains the corruption and greed existing in both.

reply to post by Open_Minded Skeptic


When utilities are concerned having only 1 game in town is indicative of partial-deregulation or an industry that is not profitable to be in and that 1 game in town is being artificially propped up and subsidized by means of government.

Partial-deregulation or the illusion of a free market tethered by the chains of government is no different than total government control save that it skews the public perspective on what a free-market truly is. See my earlier post regarding partial-deregulation.

I don't understand why the left hates privatization so much.

I cannot claim to speak for the entirety of the “left”, but being of a slightly “leftist persuasion” I will say this…In my opinion, privatization, on its own, is not bad…but, like most things in the world, it is the circumstance in which privatization is used that can become a bad thing. We can use hypotheticals to illustrate both what is dangerous in a privatized society and what could be dangerous if too much of that society is left to privatization.

For instance, when you privatize the military, or a police force, they become, essentially, mercenaries, or a “private security agency.” In doing so, they become an organization that is not obligated to uphold the social contract between the citizens and the government. To this extent, it can be easily verified by incidents in both recent and not so recent history that said organizations can, or at least will more than likely attempt, to operate in a manner to maximize profits for its shareholders. In addition, private organizations are also more likely to violate domestic and international law, as was seen with the standoffs between the US Army and Blackwater Security Forces in Iraq, as well as the plethora of, often difficult to prosecute because of their nature, cases that the “private security” forces in Iraq have been involved in, relatively recently….In essence, the problem with the privatization of military or law enforcement agencies is that their allegiances lies not with a nation, its citizens, or the rule of law, but with profit…if left on its own, essentially, as Smedley Butler once said, “war is a racket”, or further more, the degree to which war is a racket extends from simply the infrastructure and weapons development to the act of fighting as well…the prevention of violence becomes something to be profited from

But it is perhaps unfair to simply use THAT as a sole example… Let us look at another.

The privatization of resources…this is one that I find to be a bit unsettling, and perhaps it is one of the most rife with abuse in America. Again, companies that control resources, IE Water, Electric, Gas, etc., are not privy to adhere to a social contract…instead, they create their own contract with those who (often) have not choice but to buy the resources (that are essential to life) from a company which has the monopoly of that resource in a given region. Call me a bleeding heart, but it makes me sick when I read about families that have to make the choice in the summer or in the winter, to have electricity or to have food…and further, the stories of pensioners who freeze or, essentially, suffocate to death because they cannot afford to pay their heating bill in the winter or summer…Forgive me, but I, for one, simply believe that one of the foundations of this nation, “the pursuit of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” is inhibited when people die because they had to make the choice between eating or being warm…and they made the wrong choice…

This is not to say that I think private companies can’t operate in a fair and honest manner, or even simply that profits shouldn’t be made by these companies…but there is a certain level of humanity that is lacking in society when the “free market” is allowed to reign too supreme...studies have illustrated that the model by which corporations operate is, essentially, sociopathic…and I think that enough recent history, think Enron and the energy situation in California. People died, people die every year, because their heat/energy is turned off.

why not deregulate things a bit?

I think that those on the left are more in favor of creating a more mixed-economic system than going fully to socialism or communism…partial-government ownership(but certainly not full ownership, hardly any “left-wing” liberal is in favor of a fully Communist-stylized system), or stiffer government regulation are in favor because, if the political system worked how it is supposed to work, the individuals in charge of regulating the private industry would be doing so in favor of the public good…instead, and the major gripe against capitalism is that what all too often seems to happen is that, because our political system is corrupt and, some would say, too entrenched in capitalistic ideals(which have for too long gone too unregulated) the public good has dissolved into a liberal(yes, liberal) individualized notion…or, in other words, the super-capitalist state that we exist in, and that we fall further and further into, is responsible for the dissolution of the core values of our society that we constantly bemoan for their absence…IE the “right” often wants a value driven society, and yet adheres pretty strictly to a social Darwinist, dog-eat-dog, survival of the fittest, the strong prosper, mentality.

(Continued)

The left hates oppressive government regimes right?

Everyone hates repressive regimes…I don’t think that anyone says, “boy, I’d love to be abducted, tortured, and imprisoned without due process for a couple of years” in their normal, day-to-day, lives. There is a major difference between literal political oppression of a regime and the economic regulation or taxation that, far too often individuals on the right try to pass off as “oppression.”

...I don't see what people couldn't accomplish that the state could…I just don't understand really why a lot of so called leftists are statists who want bigger government. It doesn't make sense.

Rousseau, like Socrates, believed that the most “free” state was the small, city-state, because it would be more free of bureaucracy, that the people could truly represent themselves, the literal government would be small, and people would be involved and active in politics and society…additionally, that the larger a nation was, the larger its government would have to be, but with the increase in size would come a decrease in freedom…that to be stable and effective these regimes would more than likely be elected monarchies…unfortunately, we do not live in the world that could have been, as envisioned by Socrates or Rousseau….

Simply put, it is very difficult for a nation such as America to operate, unified, without a very large government in control…and rightly so. There is a lot that the State can accomplish that people cannot…International treaties for starts…more importantly, however, the government can act as a buffer against other, perhaps aggressive, regimes or multinational corporations on a level that the people simply cannot compete with. However, it is apparent that in our current system…that role of the government is somewhat inhibited and it seems, that because of deregulation, private industry and interests are the ones in control of the government.

[edit]
Lets turn this on its head now.

Why does the right favor privatization so much?

Hasn’t it become obvious that an unregulated market will continue to attempt to become more and more deregulated, while leveraging itself to create greater and greater profit margins…? Even at the expense of creating global instability?

At what point and time is the market deregulated enough?

Is there ever a time and place where the government has an ethical obligation to step in and regulate?

What happens when corporate regimes have control of the monetary supply and divide society into the1% of those who have and the 99% of those who don’t?

Why do “rightists” want to put society at the mercy of profit-driven, unregulated markets and corporations?

It doesn’t make sense, because modern economic theory puts ALL of the good cards, so to speak, in the hand of corporations and leaves nothing for the public at large.

Better question….

Why do “Right wingers” value capitalist theory over democratic theory?


[edit on 22/4/09 by madhatr137]