SENATE BILL: Public Ownership Act of 2014 (Failed)

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

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Sponsor: TNF

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I would like to see sub-region (regions within state like Triangle, triad, Charlotte Metro here in NC) co-ops be created to bring competition to the big dogs like Duke Progress Energy, which has a virtual monopoly.

But my whole goal is to decentralize not centralize under big gov't instead of big business. So I am against this proposal.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I object, on the grounds that there is no such natural monopoly with regards to railroads.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

That is amendment 61:29 by bore (see lame duck thread for explanation. )


and NAY

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Maybe not every railroad, but most cities have only one station, and are built up all around that station, meaning there is one line in and out. I don't see how that can't be a monopoly

That may apply to Britain but that is incorrect regarding the United States. Most of the localized freight traffic is handled by trucks and numerous shortlines that lease trackage from the bigger railroads. This allows for a competition between the bigger lines and ability to shift from one to the other simply by trucking it to the other terminal. Most every major metropolitan area has at least two Class 1 lines servicing the freight on a city to city, inter-regional and coast to coast basis. The only time this wasn't the case was for the twenty years that Conrail had a monopoly on New York City and New Jersey, but that is history by fifteen years and counting. CA is serviced by both BNSF and UP, the East by NS and CSX. Hell I got an X just two miles away from my house where CSX and NS trackage cross. The US railroads have long been based on competition and even as they have consolidated, that was maintained save for the Northeast where it was temporarily necessitated to have a monopoly and that was entirely because of a combination of gov't bureacrats refusing to allow the shuttering of profitless lines to nowhere and high operational costs, bottomline the gov't interference created the mess in the first place.

The private system works wonderfull for freight and where Gov't intervention has occured unnecessarily or to an excessive degree, it has led to severe problems and a near economic crisis. I cannot support the nationalization of frieght railroads under any circumstances.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Passenger service already is nationalized or run with various forms of public corporations like Amtrak. There might be a few commuter services that are private working under contract, but that is it.


It doesn't say that, it just says "provided there is a public interest", which is extremely vague. Who decides what is and what is not a public interest. TNF thinks it is in the public interest to nationalize everything that makes money.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

What is the definition of public interest in your view?

Companies exist to make a profit by a providing a good or a service to the people, whilst obeying all laws and regulations in place to protect the public. That very action serves the public interest and to the extent that it fails, is a regulatory problem (sometimes too much, sometimes too little, sometimes enough but just done stupidly and sometimes enforcement problems).

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Where are we on this?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The answer is not to surrender to gov't monolies but to organize non-profit alternatives to compete with the for profit actors and thus bring their behavior into line or maybe put them out of business.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

The answer is not to surrender to gov't monolies but to organize non-profit alternatives to compete with the for profit actors and thus bring their behavior into line or maybe put them out of business.

A non-profit monopoly and a government monopoly can be one in the same, provided this is structured correctly.

But I have less as much hatred for bigger gov't as I do for big business and I find both to be in their preferred condition, as small and decentralized as possible, otherwise it is people that get smaller and smaller relative to institutions of power/wealth.

The key to getting the desired result is to increase competition and alter the market incentives to push them in the desired direction.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It's difficult to just manufacture increased competition, though. I think we can all agree that it's very difficult for there not to be an oligopoly or a monopoly in many of these industries because of the high infrastructure costs associated with an entrance to the industry.

Unlike TNF, I don't oppose a market-based solution on principle, but I do oppose it based on the manifested outcome of such a system.

If there were a way to have a massively competitive market in these industries, I would support it. But there's not, so I can't support a market solution.

I would contend that in the South and Midwest there has been some mimimal level of success with regards to electricity and such using co-ops, but granted it is not widespread. I figure if your goals is goose something a direction, I would much prefer the gov't medlling to be in the direction of underming rather than facilitating the concentration of power (politically speaking) and resources.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Forgot how big this was so:

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[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Here is something I thought up earlier.


You create a Public Corporation (like Amtrak or PBS whaterver those are called) and have it build new production facilities. It could then sell power to sub-regional power co-opts and transmit the power over the Smart Grid that we are building as I recall.

Power is power, the oil companies share pipelines, so why couldn't power companies share power lines. If you put so many kilowatts on the grid, you can then sell that many kilowatts at the other end.

Would this work?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

I was hoping for a competative model, but at least now there is some basis to proceed with a structure that can work.


Tyrion, what are your thoughts if not necessairly on the competative aspect, but on the Public Corporation plus Co-Op idea as a structure?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

What is the present status of the smart grid that is being built? And who owns that?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Senators, a vote on final passage of the underlyin bill is now at vote, please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.


I'll introduce a text by the weekend on the power idea I discussed above. Indeed, in almost ten days only that has generated any discussion at all.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

It reverses the insufficient changes that bore made regarding railroads for one thing.

Cincy?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

You have to give an objectio nperiod after the halting of a vote, if I recall correctly.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Thee amendment has been adopted.


Can we start a new final vote?

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Senators this bill is now at final vote, Senators please vote Aye, Nay or Abstain.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

NAY

This has enough votes to fail, Senators have 24 hours to change their votes.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Vote on Final Passage of the Public Ownership Act of 2014:

Aye (4): Alfred F. Jones, Adam Griffin, TNF And TyriontheImperialist
Nay (6): Bore, DC al Fine, Goldwater, Lumine, NC Yankee and shua
Abstain (0):

Didn't Vote (0):

The bill has failed to achieve passaged.