Left Coast Road Socialism and the Market-friendly Governor
Yesterday afternoon, my friend, who has recently moved to the Left Coast, pointed to this blog to alert me to the fact that MacArthur Maze, "the complex of freeways where Berkeley, Oakland, San Francisco, and all the traffic from the East and South Bay area come to a head," has collapsed again.
("Again?" Yes, again: the exact same spot that collapsed in the 1989 earthquake.)
My first thought was, of course, "road socialism." The blog author concludes it's corrupt government, without any apparent sense of redundancy.
Last night, my friend wrote me again:
One of the first things I thought was "Oh, ferry and BART prices are going to skyrocket," as that would be the normal (aka market) method for balancing the suddenly decreased supply of "transportation between the East Bay and SF."
But no.
http://bart.gov/news/features/features20070429.asp
I'm gonna have an interesting commute tomorrow.
So Governor Schwarzenegger — who has claimed that the two people who have most profoundly impacted his thinking on economics are Milton Friedman and Adam Smith ("At Christmas I sometimes annoy some of my more liberal Hollywood friends by sending them a gift of Mr Friedman's classic economic primer, Free to Choose") — thinks the best way to deal with sudden changes in supply and demand is to obliterate the price system.
So much for electing market-friendly politicians.
Comments (4)
Its all perfectly logical if you consider the situation as a politician searching the democracy market for a deal on votes.
Published: April 30, 2007 12:35 PM
Another point is that it was an overturned gasoline tanker that caused the collapse. The truck driver (probably driving too fast) lost control of the truck, and it caught fire, literally melting a section of freeway connector ramp onto another connector below, closing them both. Fixing it will take months and many millions of dollars of taxpayer money.
This kind of accident is not very unusual -- a similar accident with a tanker truck tied up US Highway 101 near San Francisco International airport a few years ago.
In a free market, where the roads would be privately owned, such dangerous traffic would probably not be allowed on commute routes, or, more precautions would be taken to avoid this kind of disaster. No road company (or their insurance issuers) would permit this risk to exist.
Published: April 30, 2007 1:01 PM
So let me get this straight:
There is a SHORTAGE of available transportation, so the government is going to REDUCE Prices???
If the transportation networks in the Bay Area were privately-owned, ticket prices would go up 1,000% tomorrow. With the windfall profits, BART could expand their network. If prices are too hight, people would (1) drive around through the Delta Area to get to where they want to go, or (2) pay a lot of money to get the highway fixed.
Published: April 30, 2007 4:43 PM
Seems to me that Arnold was trying to trick people into not driving. Demand has shown that public mass transportation is an imperfect substitute for private vehicles(even on public roads).
You can't expect BART's behavior to approximate a private rail system, a private rail system would have to be fundamentally different in order to provide a service capable of turning a profit.
Published: April 30, 2007 10:30 PM