The Privatization of Roads and Highways - Ludwig von Mises Institute

370 The Privatization of Roads and Highways
Microsoft is not a monopoly, 32 nor was IBM before it, despite each
of them accounting for a large share of the computer market in
their respective eras. This is because entry is legal; anyone can
start up a computer business whenever he wishes to do so. Nor
does anything like competition prevail in the taxi industry,
despite the fact that, in any given large city, there are literally tens
of thousands of firms in this industry. This is because entry is precluded
by law.
Nor can we acquiesce in the notion that mere technological
considerations can “justify laissez-faire” or fail to do so. To agree
with this premise is to ignore the normative-positive distinction.
The only consideration that can justify laissez-faire or fail to do so
are those pertaining to rights, or ontology.
CENTRAL PLANNING
Above, when we discussed Mohring’s views on eminent
domain, we had occasion to remark upon his surprising unsophistication,
for an economist, on this issue. This might be due to
the fact that despite his graduate degree and his professional
affiliations, he is more of a “transportation planner” 33 than he is
dismal scientist. His article bespeaks almost ignorance of even
the possibility that the highway industry might be privatized. He
looks at the issue of roadway provision solely as a transportation
planner, equivalent to the manner in which a Soviet central planner
viewed the entire economy.
This author spends much time and effort in this regard. One
of his conclusions is that:
32William Anderson, Walter Block, Thomas J. DiLorenzo, Ilana Mercer,
Leon Snyman, and Christopher Westley, “The Microsoft Corporation in
Collision with Antitrust Law,” Journal of Social, Political and Economic Studies
26, no. 1 (Winter, 2001): 287–302.
33Mohring, “Congested Roads,“ p. 148; he speaks of his “transportationplanning
computer programs” (p. 11).