As for roads, I imagine that Intel actually does already hire contractors to build small roads on their property.
As for legal work and public hearings, those aren't "building a road" they are "dealing with bureaucracy and regulation" and "dealing with politics". Something that a large company like Intel probably has had to become rather good at, but I'm willing to accept the idea that the government itself may have an advantage here.
So the government is going to buy the proper fab equipment?
Intel probably doesn't use contractors to select the fab equipment. That process (and to an even greater extent designing and manufacturing the product) would be a competitive advantage of Intel. But remember the original point I responded to was "However if Intel was trying to build an Interstate road they would certainly be less efficient than government."
Whatever Intel is good or bad at in terms of building roads, hiring contractors to build roads, or dealing with bureaucracy and politics and regulations, isn't the point. The point in terms of the example, is that the contractors build the roads for the government, and they are probably better at it than the government. Which is why I said building roads was a bad example of the idea that government is better at some things.
BTW - I'm not denying the idea that government is the proper organization to do some things, and to fund other things that it doesn't do itself. Just saying that building roads isn't an example of the former.
I'd add that it isn't automatically in all cases a good example of the latter, but in many cases it is. Not because of some concern about efficiency, but because there isn't a viable financial model to have the market pay for many types of roads. Small roads on corporate property or in a new housing development could be paid for by the private sector. High traffic limited access roads could be paid for with tolls (including "smart tolls" to not slow things down so much), but in between I don't see any good market model to pay for the roads. And if there is no way to pay for it, then absent government action its probably not going to happen. Sometimes it shouldn't happen, but that's not a universal thing, and I don't think it applies well in this areas. Essentially no one would say we should only have local courts, and high volume limited access roads and nothing else.
But at this point I'm likely to drop it unless your reply goes off in a new direction, or has some relevant new idea. Its moved from being a discussion of the issue using examples, to a discussion where the examples themselves have become the entire subject of discussion. |
