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From: nrh@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Ethics and others in libertarianism
Message-ID: <1678@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 7-Aug-84 08:08:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: inmet.1678
Posted: Tue Aug  7 08:08:43 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 10-Aug-84 02:33:59 EDT
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Nf-From: inmet!nrh    Aug  6 22:54:00 1984

>***** inmet:net.politics / unc!howes / 11:43 am  Aug  4, 1984
>
>That seems like a non-sequiter to me.  As I remember, the railroads *used*
>to be privately owned and the government stepped in because they were
>attempting to dump off their passenger traffic as they couldn't make a
>profit on it.  

Your memory is correct, but hardly supports the idea that private 
railroads were unable to provide good passenger service:

	As the campaign against the railroads mounted, some farsighted 
	railroad men recognized that they could turn it to their
	advantage, that they could use the federal government to enforce
	their price-fixing and market-sharing agreements, and to protect
	themselves from state and local governments.  They joined the
	reformers in supporting government regulation.  The outcome was
	the establishment of the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1887....

	The real threat to the railroads arose in the 1920s, when trucks
	emerged as long-distance haulers.  The artificially high freight
	rates maintained by the ICC for railroads enabled the trucking
	industry to grow by leaps and bounds.  It was unregulated and
	highly competitive.....

	.... The increasingly rigid rules prevented railroads from
	adjusting effectively to the emergence of automobiles, buses,
	and planes as an alternative to railroads for long-distance
	passenger traffic.  They once again turned to the government,
	this time by the nationalization of passenger traffic in the
	form of Amtrak.  [Milton Friedman, Free to Choose, Chapt 7]

>I believe that the railways which provide the best service
>are historically state-run.  

Well, that's a nice thing to believe, I suppose.  I'd love to see
what you regard as "proof" for such an assertion.

>Deregulation of the airlines, while bringing
>down prices on the most competitive routes, has jacked up prices for the
>less popular routes (like from Raleigh-Durham to everywhere.)  

Isn't that just TOO BAD!  It's reall nice of you to offer to have
the state run the airlines, and RAISE fares for the rest of us to
support your air travel.  I think doing it at gunpoint (you go to 
jail if you charge free-market prices in a regulated market, remember)
is a little tacky, don't you?

>How in the
>world do you have a non-monopolitic road system?  

How in the world DID we have a non-monopolistic railroad setup?  But we
did.

>Do various private
>owners set up competing roads along the same routes?  

Sometimes.  Quite often, the railroads used to use each others
tracks (at a fee, of course).