Annual Privatization Report 2006: 20th Anniversary Edition
Transforming Government Though Privatization
edited by Leonard C. Gilroy
"For the past 20 years, Reason's Annual Privatization Report has chronicled and
analyzed the most important developments in privatization, outsourcing, and
government reform."
Cutting Back City Hall by Robert W. Poole, Jr.
reviewed by Brian Summers
September 1980
"Cutting Back City Hall is a valuable handbook for those who seek better local
services with reduced taxes. Especially useful is a listing of companies (including
consultants) that offer services to local governments on a contractual basis."
The Czech Miracle: Why Privatization went right in the Czech Republic
by Thomas W. Hazlett
"The Czech reforms were uniquely radical in transferring property from state
ownership to private hands, and the society has responded with a flowering of
initiative and entrepreneurship. And something more: civility. Politicians in
the Czech Republic do not triumph by denouncing foreigners and Jews; the
disagreements and arguments of this democratic land have not produced gridlock;
frustration and hate do not cloud the cobbled byways of beautiful and historic
Prague. And 56 percent (to 12 percent pessimists) of Czech citizens feel
"generally optimistic" about their future."
Estonia Moves to Liberty
May 2004
by Norman Barry
"A more or less complete privatization had been achieved by the mid-1990s."
Estonia's economic reforms
"As soon as it broke free of the Soviet Union, the government of Estonia decided to
privatize enterprises and land as speedily as possible."
The Ethics of Privatization
July 1986
by Tibor R. Machan
"The privatization movement has a lot of promise and must go much further than it has
already toward freeing up the economic lives of human beings. It should avoid
promising panacea, however—it should not fall prey to the temptation of the utopians
who think some system alone will solve all our societal problems. And most of all, the
movement must stress its own moral legitimacy. Without that it will be a mere passing
fancy."
Government yard sale could help bring down national debt
February 25, 2011
by Caroline May
"In addition to land, the Office of Budget and Management reports that Uncle Sam
also owns more than $1.17 trillion in fixed reproducible capital (things
like buildings and machinery) and $290 billion in inventory."
Michigan: Where Privatization Is Working
March 1998
by Lawrence W. Reed
"Through privatization, Michigan state government has shed numerous other functions
and activities in recent years, including a natural resources magazine, health care
and food service within its prisons, liquor distribution, and many aspects of the
annual state fair. But it is at the local level of government—county, city, and
school—where a genuine privatization revolution is underway. All across Michigan,
city council people, county commissioners, township supervisors, and school board
members are putting the concept to work at a pace that’s hard to keep up with."
The Miracle of Privatization
September 2000
by John Blundell
"Privatization has totally transformed the British economy. Ports, airports, coal,
gas, BP, steel, sugar, telecomms, electricity, forests, shipbuilding, motorway
restaurants, freight, nuclear power, Rolls Royce, Rover, Royal Ordnance, Short Bros.,
and water: all have been privatized to the long-term benefit of all concerned, be
they customers, shareholders, taxpayers, or all three. And not just for British people.
The leaders of these newly privatized industries have become so good at what they do
so fast that they are now doing it all over the world."
The mother of all privatizations
by Dr. Eamonn Butler
"A phone call from Windsor stopped Thatcher privatising the Royal Mail and it remains
stuck in limbo; but Germany has sold a chunk of its postal service, as did the
Netherlands. They might even buy ours, if the opportunity arose. That would be a sad
reflection on how Britain's reforming zeal now lags behind that of others. But Britain
can still take heart that, exactly 20 years ago, it started the whole world revolution
going."
The New Privatization
by Steven Malanga
"States and cities are selling their roads, bridges, and airports for eye-popping sums."
Of Private, Common, and Public
Property and the Rationale for Total Privatization
by Hans-Hermann Hoppe
"I HAVE THREE GOALS. First, I want to clarify the nature and function
of private property. Second, I want to clarify the distinction between
“common” goods and property and “public” goods and property, and
explain the construction error inherent in the institution of public goods and
property. Third, I want to explain the rationale and principle of privatization."
On the privatization of "stolen goods" in central and eastern europe
by Svetozar Pejović
Privatization and Development Edited by Steve H. Hanke
reviewed by Robert W. McGee
April 1989
"This book is a “how-to” manual on privatization, which Hartke defines as “contracting
with or selling to private parties the functions or firms previously controlled or
owned by governments.” However, whereas most privatization books emphasize how
privatization has worked in developed nations, this book spends a good deal of time
showing how privatization aids economic development in less developed countries."
The Privatization Process Edited by Terry L. Anderson and Peter J. Hill
reviewed by E. S. Savas
December 1995
"This is an interesting and excellent collection of essays related to privatization.
Although a third of the chapters appeared elsewhere in different versions, the editors
deserve credit for including those and commissioning the others. This eclectic group
of contributions is dominated by the topic of property rights: half the twelve chapters
focus on this issue —in Latin America, Mexico, Brazil, China, and post-communist
countries."
The Privatization Revolution
October 1996
by Lawrence W. Reed
"All citizens who value freedom and free markets should be encouraged by the
privatization revolution. Smaller government will leave us a freer, more responsible,
and better-served people."
A Privatization Revolution in a Most Unlikely Place
June 2002
by Lawrence W. Reed
"Rwanda, in the heart of Africa, is engaged in the continent’s most ambitious
privatization campaign. It may be the most ambitious and systematic of any country
anywhere. After experiencing the kind of stifling socialist rule that consigned
virtually all of Africa to grinding deprivation for ages, this is a country that is
embracing the private sector with deliberate policy and enormous enthusiasm."
"Robert Bayigamba runs the Privatization Secretariat, the national agency of the Rwanda
government that is supervising a continuing selloff of state companies and assets. His 24
employees draw up requests for proposals, solicit bids, monitor contracts, and slice
through red tape to facilitate foreign investment in the country. During a two-hour
interview with Bayigamba in Kigali, I learned that the privatization campaign has the
full support of Rwanda’s extremely bright, 44-year-old, tennis-playing president, Paul
Kagame, who holds a degree in professional management and business studies from the Open
University of London. Under Kagame’s direction, laws that define and protect private
property and the sanctity of contracts have been crafted, replacing a ramshackle legal
system that once put political connections ahead of justice and order."
Privatization: The Rediscovery of Entrepreneurship
August 1986
by William H. Peterson
"Privatization at the municipal level, and recent proposals to privatize state and
Federal services, can be viewed as an encouraging move toward the free market. But a
few words of caution may be in order. Much of what is being touted as privatization
may, in time, extend the powers of government."
Privatizing Federal Programs
June 1987
by Hans F. Sennholz
"The only privatization worthy of its name is the sale of government assets at market
prices to individuals who acquire clear and unhampered title to the property."
Radical Privatization and Other Libertarian Conundrums
by Walter Block
The Rationale for Total Privatization
March 14, 2011
by Hans-Hermann Hoppe
"I have three goals. First, I want to clarify the nature and function of
private property. Second, I want to clarify the distinction between "common"
goods and property and "public" goods and property, and explain the
construction error inherent in the institution of public goods and property.
Third, I want to explain the rationale and principle of privatization."
Rebuilding an Enterprise Society Through Privatization
by Margaret Thatcher
"Altogether, through our programme, we demonstrated that we could rebuild an enterprise
society and we showed that privatisation worked. It was better for the consumer, better
for the taxpayer and better for the health of an industrial and commercial country.
Many others followed our example."
Reforming Government Through Competition
by Mitchell E. Daniels
"Again and again these reforms demonstrate that people specializing in delivering a
given product or service, and spurred to constant improvement by competition and the
profit motive, can achieve their goal better than the best intentioned administrators
of the best organized government bureaucracies."
Top 10 Reasons to Rely on Private Sector Markets
April 27, 2010
by John Pisciotta
"Polling results show the tide is starting to turn against big government solutions to
economic challenges. To intensify and solidify this shift, we must make the underlying
case for decentralized market solutions. Preserving a sphere of action for private
enterprise both makes economic sense and empowers individuals as actors with moral
responsibility instead of relegating them to pawns in a high-stakes political game."
When Government Goes Private: Successful Alternatives To Public
Services by Randall Fitzgerald
reviewed by Robert W. McGee
March 1989
"Randall Fitzgerald documents literally hundreds of ways that local and national
governments can cut costs without cutting services by turning over government functions
to the private sector. Nearly every line contains useful information for anyone
interested in learning ways to shrink the size of government. Fitzgerald shows that
there is a third alternative to either cutting back on services or raising
taxes—privatize."
WPC on contracting out and privatization
A collection of policy briefs and press releases devoted to
explaining how functions can be better performed in the private
sector, and how other functions can be achieved in a more costly
fashion by contracting them out to private providers.
The Limits of Privatization
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
Don't privatize tax collection.
Market Reform—Idiocy, Myth and Reality:
Latin America: Misery feeds on macroeconomic neglect; a truly free market needs
strong institutions.
January 20, 1997
by Alvaro Vargas Llosa
"Throughout Latin America—particularly in Peru, Mexico and Argentina—telephone users
suffer high rates and poor service because state telephone monopolies have been sold
to private monopolies. Users then wrongly deduce that capitalism is the cause of this
abuse. They fall to understand that this is what happens when you transfer a closed
market from public to private control."
On the Privatization of “Stolen Goods” in Central and Eastern Europe
by Svetozar Pejovich
"With few exceptions, the privatization of state-owned assets has failed to contribute
to the transformation of central and eastern European countries into free-market,
private-property economies. This relative failure can be attributed to three factors: the
reliance on neoclassical economics, the absence of decommunization, and the unwillingness
of the new elite in the region to assign ownership rights in state-owned assets to the
true owners."
Privatization of Public-Sector Pensions: The U.S. Navy Pension Fund, 1800-1842
by Robert Clark, Lee Craig, and Jack Wilson
Social security privatization holds the promise of higher returns—and commensurably
higher risk. But if the history of the naval pension fund is any indication, Congress
may succumb to the urge to shift that risk to taxpayers rather than keep risk linked
to return."
Privatization: Two Perils
November 1986
by Ridgway K. Foley, Jr.
"If the State decides that certain goods and services must be offered, and that the
police power must pass upon the quality and quantity of those goods and services, the
supposed transfer from the public coercive apparatus to the private creative process
is a sham. The result—a coerced economy—does not constitute a market at all; rather,
the clumsy claw of government has tinkered with the system and obliterated any
semblance of true liberty."
The Political Economy of Wildfires
June 08, 2000
by John A. Baden, Ph.D. and Pete Geddes
"In the fire arena it's time to consider replacing Smokey's minions with private
contractors. Agency morale has plummeted and pay stagnated. The Forest Service is
hard pressed to staff fire crews with experienced members. In response, a private
industry of wildlands firefighting has emerged. The Wildfire Contractors Association
and the Ash Kickers provides crews ready to go. Cache Plus and the National Fire
Fighter Corporation supply gear from hoses to trucks. Ecological and economic forces
have provided an excellent seed bed for environmental entrepreneurs."
Judgement Day: The Case for Alternative Dispute Resolution
by Adam Thierer
"Our courts are slow, outdated, and costly. Adam Thierer shows how people in the US have
abandoned them for private arbitration: and how the state and federal courts have had to
accommodate this change. A model for modernising the court service in the United Kingdom
and elsewhere?"
Private Judge
"Private Judge provides retired Federal, State and International Judges to help
resolve business and technology disputes. Our objective is to resolve disputes fairly
and confidentially while saving management time and expense."
Privatizing the Judiciary
August 1988
by Daniel J. Popeo
"In fact, the litigation explosion that occurred in the 1970s (coupled with a
simultaneous increase in judicial activism) has already caused a small number of
entrepreneurs to set up alternative dispute resolution systems. The purpose of these
systems is to ease the current judicial bottleneck, to allow for expeditious dispute
resolution, and to open up the judicial process to a class of litigants who are finding
it increasingly costly to use the public court system."
Texas Association of Mediators
"The Texas Association of Mediators is a statewide, interdisciplinary organization
whose Mission is to provide leadership and education in the field of mediation,
and valued benefits to the organization's Members."
Free Libraries
1891
by M.D. O’brien
"Free Libraries are typical examples of the compulsory co-operation everywhere gaining
ground in this country. Like all State socialism they are the negation of that liberty
which is the goal of human progress. Every successful opposition to them is therefore a
stroke for human advancement. This mendacious appeal to the numerical majority to force
a demoralizing and pauperizing institution upon the minority, is an attempt to revive,
in municipal legislation, a form of coercion we have outgrown in religious matters."
Liberating libraries
"Since July 1997, twenty-five public libraries in Riverside County, California have been
run by Library Systems and Services Inc - a private-sector service supplier - working
in partnership with the County. Under the $5 million contract, LSSI promised 25% increases
in library hours and in the book purchasing budget. The results have been praised as
showing that the library service can be managed very effectively by private concerns
without compromising its ethos and integrity."
Parking Meter Privatization in the Spotlight, Part II
April 16, 2009
by Leonard Gilroy
"Today I'll try to offer some perspective on the operational challenges that the city
and its private partner, Chicago Parking Meters, LLC, have experienced thus far in the
rollout of the months-old initiative."
A Model Park
Howard Husock
"One of the best new things that's happened in Boston in years is Post Office Square
Park—a triumph not only of urban design but also of creative private financing that
advances both private interests and the public interest in equal measure."
Private Sector Can Rescue State Parks Headed for Closure
February 24, 2010
by Leonard Gilroy
"Deficit-challenged states that are closing state parks under budget pressure should
consider a powerful alternative that can ensure that parks stay open—leasing parks to
private sector operators."
Set the Parks Free
Winter 1997
by Richard Gilder
"New Yorkers are justifiably proud of the newly restored Central Park—but few understand
how this renaissance has come about. I’ve had a hand in it as a founding trustee of an
organization called the Central Park Conservancy. With thousands of others, I’ve given
time and money to the Conservancy to rescue the park from inconsistent management and
crippling budget cuts. Seventeen years after it was launched, the Conservancy has
invested $165 million in the park for operations, capital projects, and endowing future
maintenance. Today it is the de facto manager of Central Park."
Crime Stoppers: Frustrated by incompetent policing, South Africans are turning
to private alternatives
by Jim Peron
"Given the government's manifest failure to deal with surging crime, many South
Africans are turning to private alternatives. These include not only gated
communities for the wealthy but security services and self-help arrangements
that benefit the middle class and poor. They have achieved striking successes,
sometimes despite active opposition by the government."
Growing Use of Private Security
by National Center for Policy Analysis
"Businesses, homeowners and communities around the world are
increasingly relying on private security rather than tax-supported police."
The Growth of Privatized Policing
February 1991
by Nicholas Elliott
"One of the most successful examples is the small town of Reminderville in northern Ohio.
Faced with having to pay $180,000 a year for continued county policing, residents decided
in 1981 to hire Corporate Security Inc. for $90,000 per year. The firm also increased the
number of patrol cars in the area, and improved the emergency response time from the
previous 45 minutes to six minutes."
Michigan: Where Privatization Is Working
March 1998
by Lawrence W. Reed
"After residents complained that the city’s police officers didn’t show up for their
shifts and rarely stepped out of their cars, the security of several public-housing
neighborhoods in Flint was contracted to a private company. It was the first time in
the state’s history that a city refunded a portion of its citizens’ taxes so that a
private firm could replace local law-enforcement personnel."
To Serve and Protect: Privatization and Community in Criminal Justice by
Bruce Benson
reviewed by Morgan O. Reynolds
"Benson documents the substantial private effort to combat crime in the United
States, estimated at $300 billion a year, and therefore larger than the public-sector
effort. This will continue to grow rapidly, Benson predicts, if only to compensate for
continuing public failure."
Why Crime Declines
January 2000
by Bruce L. Benson
"A comprehensive 1992 statistical study used data from 124 Standard Metropolitan
Statistical Areas in an effort to analyze the effect of both public police and private
security on the overall safety of communities and on decision-making by offenders.
The addition of public police showed no statistically significant deterrence, but the
result of private security was significant. Additional private security personnel
correlated with less crime, suggesting that the benefits spill over into the community
at large."
Plunderers of the Public Revenue: Voluntaryism and the Mails
by Carl Watner
"As postal history demonstrates, it's natural for customers to
patronize private alternatives when government services get too
slow or too expensive."
Spooner vs. U.S. Postal System
Reprinted from American Legion Magazine, January 1981.
by Lucille J. Goodyear
"To begin with, Spooner couldn't understand why the Post Office should have a monopoly on mail
delivery. He was schooled enough in law, however, to know that the Constitution ordered Congress
to provide for mail delivery and it had done so with a postal department. But the wily Spooner
found a loophole – the Constitution did not declare that a private citizen could not do likewise."
Who Caused the Reduction of Postage? Ought He to be Paid?
by Lysander Spooner
This is a documentary history of Lysander Spooner's private mail service
and the federal government's responses.
A Future of Private Roads and Highways
by Walter Block
"I advocate the complete, total, and full privatization of all roads, streets,
highways, byways, avenues, and other vehicular thoroughfares. And I am serious about
this, deadly serious."
Good Roads Sooner: Public-Private Partnerships in New South Wales
Bob Carr
"Australians will pay tolls to get a road now rather than face a decade or more stuck
in traffic"
New Ideas for Roads
by Jeffrey A. Tucker
"Is there nothing new in the world of libertarian ideas? There is plenty with
Walter Block's remarkable new treatise on private roads, a 494-page book that will cause
you to rethink the whole of the way modern transportation networks operate. It is bold,
innovative, radical, compelling, and shows how free-market economic theory is the
clarifying lens through which to see the failures of the state and to see the alternative
that is consistent with human liberty."
Private enterprise does it better
by John Stossel
"Indiana used to lose money on its toll road. Then Gov. Mitch Daniels leased it to private
developers. Now it makes a profit. The new owners spent $40 million on electronic tolling. That's
saved them 55 percent on toll collection. They saved $20 per mile by switching to a better
de-icing fluid. They bought a new fleet of computerized snowplows that clear roads using less
salt. Drivers win, and taxpayers win."
Private Highways in America, 1792-1916
February 1st, 1994
by Dr. Klein
"Private roadways have always made philosophical sense. Now even many public officials
understand that they make economic sense as well."
Private neighbourhood management
"Studies by Oscar Newman, comparing similar public and private streets, found that crime
and burglary was half or two-thirds lower in the privately managed areas. Nor is it just
that crime is decanted onto neighbouring streets; the private establishments actually help
stabilize a wider area against decline. And not surprisingly, property values in the
privately managed areas have risen."
Private Roads Work
by Bart Frazier
"The issue of private roads stymies those who might otherwise be diehard libertarians."
Privatize Highway Projects
"A number of states and several countries around the world are using private capital
to design, build and operate highways, recovering the investment through tolls charged
to users."
Privatizing Social Security the Right Way
by Laurence J. Kotlikoff
"Unless Social Security benefits are drastically reduced or the system is privatized,
taxpayers can expect to see Social Security payroll taxes raised by 50 percent—bringing
total payroll taxes, including Medicare taxes, to as high as 25 percent. Full
privatization, unlike its alternatives, could achieve all of the legitimate goals of
Social Security while accelerating economic growth."
Social Security Privatization: A Personal View
July 2002
by Roger M. Clites
"When I retired in 1991 I elected to withdraw only interest from my TIAA-CREF account
and leave the principal untouched until I was required by law to begin drawing it down.
(That occurred a few years ago.) That interest, on just 22 years of investments, was
greater than my Social Security check, which was based on a lifetime of work. The
investments in private businesses paid off far better than the taxes taken for Social
Security."
How private groups can help conservation
"Conservation bodies such as RSPB and Birds Australia act as highly efficient agents
to manage wildlife habitat. Such organizations are becoming increasingly popular and are
attracting substantial funding, not only in terms of membership fees, but also through
donations, legacies and commercial activities. They tend to be far more committed,
innovative and efficient than state-run bodies in terms of preserving and protecting
endangered species, other wildlife, and natural habitats."
Private Preservation of Wildlife: A Visit to the South African Lowveld
by Nancy Seijas and Frank Vorhies
"In South Africa, conservation is treated more or less as a business, in which
government and the private sector compete. Kruger National Park, a game reserve the
size of New Jersey, is owned and run by the South African government. Right on its
border is a consortium of 20 smaller game parks, all privately owned. They receive
no government funding, and are subject to no specific wildlife regulations."
Private property rights to wildlife: the Southern African experiment
by Kay Muir-Lesche and Robert H. Nelson
Amidst the chaos in property rights protection in Southern Africa
lies a success story. The private ownership of wildlife over the
past twenty-five years has been relatively effective in recovering
endangered species. Available in Adobe PDF format.
Privatization: Best Hope for a Vanishing Wilderness
February 1988
by Lawrence W. Reed
"Indeed, it is becoming increasingly apparent inside and outside the conservation
movement that the incentives inherent in privatized affairs are potent motivators
that many properties now “publicly owned” could sorely use. In any event, as this
sketch of just eight groups suggests, it would be a grave mistake for anyone to
assume that those doing the most or the best to conserve our natural environment
must be wearing government uniforms."
Saved by shooting: How private game parks protect wildlife
"Far more land is now devoted to game parks in Zimbabwe since landowners were given the
privileges and responsibilities of ownership. In 1975 17,000 sq km of private land was
given over to wildlife; by 1990 this figure had risen to 30,000 sq km. As a result there
has been a marked increase in the populations of elephant, rhino, crocodile, ostrich,
leopard and cheetah."
Wildlife in the Marketplace edited by Terry L. Anderson and Peter J. Hill
reviewed by Jane M. Orient
April 1996
"This compendium of nine articles takes examples from the Hudson's Bay Company,
1700-1763, to emerging Africa, to show how to turn wildlife from a liability into
an asset. It is not a collection of rhetoric but of detailed economic analyses of
how to manage wildlife resources, including endangered species, buttressed with
a wealth of references, tables, and graphs."
Wild Success
by Karl Hess, Jr.
"The lessons of community-based conservation echo from the savannahs and veld of
Southern Africa to the very heart of America."
Privately Operated Zoos Now Considered the Standard
May 29, 2012
by Harris Kenny
"policymakers are partnering with the private sector for zoos, and comparable services
like animal shelters and parks"
Zoo, Inc.
January 1993
by David Haarmeyer and Elizabeth Larson
"For years, private zoological societies worked alongside city zoo officials, raising
funds and running education programs and concession stands. Now, as local governments
are forced to rein in runaway budgets, zoological societies are taking charge of
operating entire zoos. Nearly 40 percent of the 165 American zoos accredited by the
American Zoological Association—among them, zoos in Fort Worth, Cincinnati, New Orleans,
San Diego, and Jackson, Missis-sippi—are run by private, nonprofit societies. And that
figure is on the rise: Officials in Boston, Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, Fresno, California,
and Birmingham, Alabama, among other U.S. cities, are now considering privatization as
well."