Forbes contributor Tim Worstall published a piece this week called Trump To Privatise Air Traffic Control – Why Not, You Get All Future Profits Now When You Sell. The article begins with the arguments people have made against the sale, like the fact that the United States has already invested public money, but he continues by claiming that such an argument is largely irrelevant:
But note that when you sell something you get some money for it. And the amount, by definition, that you get for selling it is the net present value of all future profits from that asset. That’s just what prices are. So, instead of our having to wait it out until 2100 to get whatever profits there might be we get them, discounted by the interest rate, today.
Sure, there are methods of privatisation like putting the system into a non-profit corporation and so on. But the basic idea that the taxpayer will get the current value of the system plus any future profits, appropriately discounted, is still true.
Trump will then deliver remarks in the White House Rose Garden about his vision for separating air traffic control from the federal government – an idea that has been billed as a way to speed up modernization efforts, but one that has run into a buzz saw of opposition on Capitol Hill.
[…]The true best argument in favour of privatised infrastructure is simply that government isn’t a very good way of either deciding what infrastructure to build nor of running it once built. If you want to argue about that then consider first the California high speed train set and then Amtrack, then come back to me.
That taxpayer-funded California high-speed train is over budget, poorly-routed, and provides no time or cost savings to the consumer. One day, because of Trump’s decision, we may look at the past airport experience with the same disdain as that ill-fated project.
Source: Forbes
Image: a380flightdeck
Thanks for the warning.
I hate click bait more than zombies