A private market encourages progress because an unproductive company will lose money. A subsidized market leads to undesirable economic effects because it doesn’t reflect the product’s true cost effectiveness and becomes dependent on handouts, and so do the people using it. It’s a concept that has been ignored by politician types always looking for problems to “solve” for the last seventy-plus years or so.
Consider for instance the Petro Canada example. Although fuel may sometimes be more expensive after privatization, it leads to more efficient means of transportation being utilized, such as the railroad. New technologies become more cost competitive even if their price does not decrease significantly. This all happens due to simple market forces rather than a social engineering effort from the government.
Also, while I agree that many crown corporations such as Canadian National were pretty well managed, this depends on having the “right people” in charge. These companies have been very lucky over the years compared with just about any business venture the United States government has ever gotten itself into. I highly doubt that the Canadian government of today would be able to repeat that. I think CN got out at the right time.
Conrail was a rare success but I agree that it was a result of deregulation and the fact that it was being run by railroad people without the government trying to micromanage it. Canadian National was fortunate to operate under similar circumstances. Compare this to General Motors and Chrysler right now who are being seized by the good idea crew, as pointed out.
It also seems like Canadian Pacific has been more efficient and maybe better managed over the years than Canadian National. I kind of compare this to UP and BNSF. UP was built with massive subsidies and land grants while BNSF predecessor Great Northern was almost completely a private venture. Even today it seems like UP has an inflated ego and cozier with politicians while BNSF is more independent from this garbage, and has better service too.
The private Canadian National has some problems and I agree that it could benefit from a little management change. Employees and even shippers complain about it on both sides of the line. But overall I think privatization has been good for CN. Since privatization Canadian National has been able to expand and gain a geographic advantage that none of the other railroads have.
I will leave aside my thoughts of Tommy Douglas and Elliot Trudeau...
By the way, how is that DirecTV service doing?
Consider for instance the Petro Canada example. Although fuel may sometimes be more expensive after privatization, it leads to more efficient means of transportation being utilized, such as the railroad. New technologies become more cost competitive even if their price does not decrease significantly. This all happens due to simple market forces rather than a social engineering effort from the government.
Also, while I agree that many crown corporations such as Canadian National were pretty well managed, this depends on having the “right people” in charge. These companies have been very lucky over the years compared with just about any business venture the United States government has ever gotten itself into. I highly doubt that the Canadian government of today would be able to repeat that. I think CN got out at the right time.
Conrail was a rare success but I agree that it was a result of deregulation and the fact that it was being run by railroad people without the government trying to micromanage it. Canadian National was fortunate to operate under similar circumstances. Compare this to General Motors and Chrysler right now who are being seized by the good idea crew, as pointed out.
It also seems like Canadian Pacific has been more efficient and maybe better managed over the years than Canadian National. I kind of compare this to UP and BNSF. UP was built with massive subsidies and land grants while BNSF predecessor Great Northern was almost completely a private venture. Even today it seems like UP has an inflated ego and cozier with politicians while BNSF is more independent from this garbage, and has better service too.
The private Canadian National has some problems and I agree that it could benefit from a little management change. Employees and even shippers complain about it on both sides of the line. But overall I think privatization has been good for CN. Since privatization Canadian National has been able to expand and gain a geographic advantage that none of the other railroads have.
I will leave aside my thoughts of Tommy Douglas and Elliot Trudeau...
By the way, how is that DirecTV service doing?
