Here is a letter in a recent “Mr. Roadshow” column in the San Jose Mercury News. The letter illustrates the problems in plutocratic/libertarian thinking vs democracy. (Note: Caltrain is the commuter-rail line serving towns between San Francisco and San Jose.)
Your recent article on Caltrain’s $30 million deficit is once again showing your socialist leanings. Saying Larry Ellison of Oracle or Sergey Brin and Larry Page of Google or Steve Jobs of Apple should rescue Caltrain is one of your famous inane ideas. If Caltrain cannot operate without taxpayer funding, it should go out of business. Just how much taxpayer money is used to fund the likes of Southwest Airlines, Greyhound Bus or any taxi services? As a taxpayer, I have never received a billing statement from any of these companies for not using their business! If you want the rich to pay for Caltrain, I suggest you tax rich athletes, actors, entertainers, the major news network anchors and, of course, rich politicians such as Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry, to name a few. Private business is the heart of America! Not government! Maybe you should quit the Mercury News and go to work for Gov. Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown and become director of Caltrans.
Let’s look at the assumptions in this letter:
Never mind the idea of public infrastructure, courts, etc. that provide the underpinnings of all business. An airline can’t operate without an airport, air traffic control, weather forecasting, etc. A bus or taxi company cannot operate without roads, police, and the rest of the system. No business would exist without courts and the financial system…
I want to explore a deeper question. What are we, as citizens in a democracy, entitled to? Yes, that word, “entitled.” There are things we are entitled to because we are human beings and citizens. We are supposedly still a one-person-one-vote system and not a one-dollar-one-vote system, and we are supposedly entitled to equal opportunity, equal access and an equal voice.
But for-profit systems only respect those with lots of money. In a democracy is it right to require people to have a lot of money have access to transportation? To health care? To information?
What are your thoughts?
This post originally appeared at Campaign for America’s Future (CAF) at their Blog for OurFuture. I am a Fellow with CAF.
your comments indicate that you really do not understand economics. Let us examine a few of the assumptions you question:
If XXXX cannot operate without taxpayer funding, it should go out of business. (Insert Caltrain, Public Radio, schools, libraries, health clinic for the poor, etc., as needed.) – the government does (and rightly so) support some activities that do not show short term profits. Examples of this are schools, wastewater treatment, and public health activities. These are all and good because we know that if these activities are not done then the longterm costs to society are quite large. However, support of these type of activities has to be carefully scrutinized. If the activity does not provide an easily identified benefit or if it could be done by the private sector, then the government should not do it. Public radio is exactly such an activity that one should question. We have plenty of radio stations without the public supported stations. What general benefit does society receive? If the programming is perceived as desired then the private market will provide it. Libraries provide general benefits and, frankly, they are cheap. I would have said schools are something that government should provide. However, being a former member of a school board has made me re-examine this. Schools are so tied up in bueracracy that I am begining to think that students would be better served if their parents were given a voucher. Let the private market compete for these vouchers.
Private business is the heart of America! Not government! Well, yes, private business generates the revenue that our society could not function without. So, I believe this assumption is valid.
No taxpayer money goes to help airlines, bus companies, etc. operate. Depends upon what you mean by government money. The government supports a legal framework that allows these companies to exist. Also, we support infrastructure such as roads, sewers, airports, etc. that these companies use. However, these companies generate plenty of tax revenue, too. So, I would guess it is an even split.
But for-profit systems only respect those with lots of money. In a democracy is it right to require people to have a lot of money have access to transportation? To health care? To information? This illustates your complete misunderstanding of markets. The purpose of a market is to allocate resources in a way that maximizes benefits to society. Revenue is the way this is measured. If the product or service is needed then the marketplace rewards it with revenue. This is not evil, it is just a way of keeping score. Don’t we want the best cars to be rewarded with the best revenue so that the companies making them will make more of them? Don’t we want the best shoe companies rewarded with the most revenue? So forth and so forth.
The notion of readers labeling anyone a “socialist” for supporting Caltrain is as annoying as it is balloon-headed. All public transportation, including the roads we all drive on every day, is socialist. So are public schools, public libraries, national parks and the municipal police and fire departments we all rely on. Caltrain can’t raise fares to cover all it operating costs because it is competing with travel by car, which, except for your car and the gas you put in it, is entirely paid for by the government (that is, all of us).
Anonymous above writes, “Don’t we want the best shoe companies rewarded with the most revenue?” The market will take care of that. Unlike in the late 19th century, when unregulated capitalism produced a few billionaires and millions of shoeless, hungry children, what “we” the American people, care about now is that American kids have shoes, food and a fair shot at the american dream.