The Privatization of Roads and Highways - Ludwig von Mises Institute

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An Interview with Walter Block 413 vate roads, you would also buy access insurance. You wouldn’t want to be trapped on your own property. No one would buy any real estate at all unless he were sure that this sort of entrapment couldn’t happen to him. Indeed, it is in the financial interest of the owner not to do this, since he wants to attract, not repel, people from living adjacent to his road, so that he can make more profit from them. QUESTION: If a man wants to live alone in a rural area where there currently is no road—would he likely bear the brunt of the cost of building and maintaining it? Once built will he own it? WALTER BLOCK: Yes, he would bear the full brunt of making the road, just like he now bears the full brunt of carting bricks, plaster, cement, to this out-of-the-way place. And of course, he would then own the road, just like he now owns his house. There would be no government subsidy, such as provided by the post office, to deliver mail at out of the way places for the same price as that which obtains in the city, where it is cheaper to deliver mail, thanks to economies of scale. QUESTION: Ditching government. Let’s say that laissez-faire capitalists within a particular municipality are successful at substituting a free-market enterprise for every local, state-run service; education, roads, sewer, etc. Let’s say that local taxes peel back to about 50 percent of their former levels (even though they should be zero because the government now provides zero services). How do you think that local citizens can work together to eject the municipal government? Or do you think it is possible? Keep in mind free-market solutions are now proven to work better and a majority of the local population understands that the local government is useless bunch of bandits. WALTER BLOCK: I’m not sure I fully understand this question. The only way to eject any government (municipal, state, federal) is to have a near majority or more of libertarians who vote the rascals out of office. QUESTION: Did the original inhabitants of North America “own” the land? Did they have “property rights” and was this land stolen from them (the Indians) by the white man? If so what
414 The Privatization of Roads and Highways is the antidote to this wrongdoing? Do “we” the current owners of this land give it back when and where an heir to the original owners can be found? Can there be parallels drawn between property stolen from the Russian or Cuban aristocracies in the communist revolutions with property stolen from Indians in North America? What’s the difference? These questions are all relevant to road building, since if the Native Americans really own virtually all the land, and they do not wish to sell it for roads, that pretty much ends expanding this form of transportation. If reparations are paid to them in the form of land, we may be forced to destroy most of our highways. WALTER BLOCK: First of all, even if I accept your premise in its entirety, that the Indians really own most of the territory of the U.S., it is by no means clear that they would wish all or even most of the roads to be turned back into farmland or forests or hunting preserves, or whatever. Surely, most of this acreage is worth far more in support of highways and streets than for these other purposes. If the Natives own it, why would they want to suffer the vast economic losses entailed in such conversions? Because farms and woodlands are more consistent with their “culture”? Unlikely in the extreme. They now preside over a plethora of western, oriented, gambling establishments, due to loopholes in the law, and it is difficult to argue that these are part of their traditions. No, profit maximization is no monopoly of white, blacks or orientals. Second, it is by no means clear that the Indians are the rightful owners of anything like the entire U.S. Under libertarian law, they could justly claim only those parts of the land that they homesteaded, or occupied, not hunted over. They owned those paths that they used to get from their winter to their summer places. This is based on the Lockean-Rothbardian-Hoppean homesteading theory. I estimate that they owned, in this way, at most 1 percent of the land in the US. 3 3 See on this several articles I wrote on the topic: Walter Block, “On Reparations to Blacks for Slavery,” Human Rights Review 3, no. 4
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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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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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13 Transition to Private Roads * Le
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Transition to Private Roads 281 pre
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Transition to Private Roads 283 Blo
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Transition to Private Roads 285 to
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Transition to Private Roads 287 But
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Transition to Private Roads 289 The
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Part IV Critiques
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15 Comment on “Roads, Bridges, Su
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Comment on “Roads, Bridges, Sunli
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16 Roads, Bridges, Sunlight, and Pr
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Roads, Bridges, Sunlight, and Priva
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17 Who is Responsible for Traffic D
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Who is Responsible for Traffic Deat
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