Freedom, Society, and State - Ludwig von Mises Institute

izing prIvate contractors revealed that:
Cities, without exception, reported that the
contractors had been both responsive and
reliable. The contractor, of course, has a
vested interest in doing a good job ••• Of
all of the cities contacted, not one jndicat
edt hat the con t r act 0 r had fa i 1edt 0 me e t
the standards required••• What about going
back to a municipal operation? Says [A. G.]
Raymondi [Superintendent of Public Works for
the cit Y 0 f Qui n c y, Ma s s • ] ,. "We wo u 1d never
be able to get back to it now."(87)
Several recent studies have disclosed that public
colle c t ion s e r vic e s are a p prox i rna tel y f 0 u r times as
costly as private ageneies.(88)
But community corporations would not have to contract
out. In "mutualistic" fashion a la Proudhon they
cou I d, ei ther independent ly or in federat ion wi th other
c omm un i tie s 0 reo r po rat ion s, buy the i r own capit a I
equipment and then either operate the utilities themselves
or hire outside firms to do so.(89) Such corporations
might even find it profitable to sell their
s e r vicest 0 sur r 0 unding c omm un i tie s . 0 r the c omm un i t Y
corporations might even find it wise to combine the two
approaches. For services in which the capital investment
would be relatively small and/or mobile, like fire
and gar bag e col lee t ion, a c omm unit yeo r po rat ion migh t
wish to bring in outside firms. For if dissatisfied
with the quality of the service they could fire the
current firms and bring in new ones without much disr
u p t ion 0 f s e r vice s • But the supply 0 f wa t e r, gas and
electricity is much different. Here, the capital
e qui pm e n t d emand e dis bot h I a r g e and s tat iona r y • On e
could not fire one firm and hire a new one without some
disruption of service. In thiS case, a community corpo
rat ion mig h t fin d i t be s t to ownit sown capita 1
equipment and either operate its own plants or hire an
outs ide firm to run them. Numerous other possibilities
are con c e i v a b I e and precisely wh i c h 0 n e s wo u I d preva i I
is impossible to tell in advance.
The libertarian wrItings on public utilities tend
to be rather scarce and theoretically abstract. Consequently,
I have taken these occasional and theoretical
remarks and tried to construct various scenarios, consistent
wIth the lIbertarian paradigm. What the foregoing
indIcates is that, gIven the ingenuity of the
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