The Privatization of Roads and Highways - Ludwig von Mises Institute

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Transition to Private Roads 289 The problem is, rather, that the owner of the land abutting the road is compelled to accept this contract, whereas, in an ideal situation, people can pick and choose which contracts to sign, and which to avoid. Yes, this is indeed a problem. In the truly free society, no one is forced to deal with anyone else. And here, admittedly, the property owner of interior land will have to deal with the road owner(s) who surround his holdings. There are two ways to deal with the objection: one valid, the other not entirely so. Let us consider the invalid argument first. It is possible to argue that this difficulty is by no means limited to roads. For example, when the previously nationalized bakery or butcher shop becomes returned to its proper home, private enterprise, the people who used to patronize the government-run provider of these services will have no choice but to become customers of the new, privately operated firms selling these products. This claim is strengthened if these are the only such operations in town, and the next closest purveyor is located hundreds of miles away. This argument goes some of the way in the direction of dealing with the objection but does not completely attain this goal. The kernel of truth in it is that the land owner in question might conceivably not be as much inconvenienced by the transition to private roads as would hold true for the buyers of these foodstuffs. The latter might actually die, if alternative sources of food were not attainable; the landlocked homeowner need suffer no such fate, given that due consideration is given to the blockade issue. Where this argument fails, however, is that, still, the blockaded owner is compelled by law to deal with the new road owner abutting his property, and this is simply not true for the grocery shopper. And this, despite the fact that the latter might die as a result of the privatization, and cannot occur, arguendo, in the case of the former. That is, we must distinguish between dying as a result of privatization, a scenario we are contemplating merely for the sake of logical argument, and being forced by law to deal with a firm, regardless of the outcome in terms of life expectancy. The objection we are now considering concerns only the latter issue; thus, no resort to the former can fully answer it.
290 The Privatization of Roads and Highways A better reply to this objection is to note that the difficulty stems not from the privatization process itself, but rather from the initial takeover by the government of the road building industry. The reason the landlocked property owner must deal with the new, private road owner, if there is to be a new, private road owner, emanates from the very logic of the situation. Like it or not, the landlocked property owner, at present, is logically compelled to deal with the abutting road owner, which happens to be the state apparatus. The reason internal landowners are forced to deal with road owners, whoever they are, private or public, is part and parcel of geographical praxeology. Absent tunneling under the road, or building a bridge over it— that is, if we confine ourselves to two-dimensional space— Euclidian geometry, not man made law, mandates that homeowners somehow “deal with” road owners. All that privatization will do is change the identity of the institution, from public to private, that Euclid “forces” the landowner to be related to, contractually.
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The Privatization of Roads and High
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This book is dedicated to my fellow
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vi The Privatization of Roads and H
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viii The Privatization of Roads and
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x The Privatization of Roads and Hi
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Acknowledgments Iwould like to than
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Introduction Most people who read t
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Introduction xvii dealing with obje
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1 Free-Market Transportation: Denat
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Free-Market Transportation: Denatio
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48 The Privatization of Roads and H
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3 Public Goods and Externalities: T
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Public Goods and Externalities: The
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Part II Applications
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6 Road Socialism * What are the bes
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Road Socialism 185 of the state app
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Road Socialism 187 It is in order t
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Road Socialism 189 indicates that v
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Road Socialism 191 vehicle inspecti
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Road Socialism 193 that “The domi
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Road Socialism 195 imaginative and
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Road Socialism 197 2. Perhaps the p
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Road Socialism 199 bouncer, to each
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7 Compromising the Uncompromisable:
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Compromising the Uncompromisable: S
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8 Roads and the Immigration Issue T
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Roads and the Immigration Issue 217
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9 The Motor Vehicle Bureau Newly ar
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The Motor Vehicle Bureau 225 In the
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10 Privatize Public Highways * Acro
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Privatize Public Highways 231 Thoma
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11 Homesteading City Streets: An Ex
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Homesteading City Streets: An Exerc
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Homesteading City Streets: An Exerc
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Who is Responsible for Traffic Deat
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20 Aiding and Abetting Road Sociali
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Aiding and Abetting Road Socialism
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Part V Conclusion
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APPENDIX I Annual U.S. Street & Hig
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Appendices 423 It cannot be denied
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