You're still not describing a "market failure".
This market failure is called an externality. The people who use Plastic Bags don't pay for Plastic Bag pollution. I mean, its a very small externality in the great scope of things, so I don't really give much of a care. Maybe about... $0.05, the current tax on plastic bags in my area to take care of this externality.
But its still clearly a market failure (specifically an externality). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality
A plastic bag tax shifts the externality and fixes the market failure. Now either the grocery store or the consumer who uses the plastic bags have to pay for the pollution they cause.
The reason why San Francisco is dumb is because they go off the rails and turn into a nanny state. I agree with San Fran that Plastic Bags are a nuisance and that somebody needs to pay for the cleanup effort. But the ban goes too far.
On the other hand, a minor-bag tax levied by the local municipality (who pays for the road-cleanup crews who pick up the plastic bags) makes 100% sense. That's the purpose of taxes: to force people who otherwise aren't paying for something... to pay for a service that they're taking advantage of. Taxes are a lovely mechanism for solving market failures that involve externalities.
Except this pollution isn't really caused (the example being given over and over are bags blowing in the wind) if people dispose of them properly.
That is no longer covering an externality, that is punishing the many for the careless actions of the few, something that is always immoral all of the time in my mind.
Fine the litterbug companies and litterbug people, leave everyone else the hell alone.
Here in DC we have a $.05 charge on plastic bags. Some of that money goes to restoring the river which is choked with plastic (and other) waste. Plastic bag usage has dropped 80% since the bag tax was instituted. So, we got a great outcome (lessened externalities from litter) at minimal cost and inconvenience. Some of that is financial, less money (public and private) devoted to cleaning, less damage to public infrastructure (clogged sewers), less need to restore the river.
An alternative approach DC could have taken to the bag litter problem would have been to increase the enforcement budget for littering. It would have been extremely expensive and its doubtful it would have cut down anywhere close to the amount of bag litter, so society would still bear the cost of the externality.
Most people would not pick the latter alternative, and would consider the minimal costs imposed on innocents to be well worth the outcome. Moral absolutism over pragmatism can result in cutting off your nose to spite your face, in this case, continuing to bear the burden of the externality.
The slippery slope might be a logical fallacy, but history points to it as the normal mode of operation for a government.
You throw away a plastic bag, which is 100% legal btw, you create a long-term effect.
If you outlaw the disposal of plastic bags, how the hell do you enforce this regime? Do you hire a bunch of police officers to dig through people's garbage, and then fine people whenever they find a plastic-bag in the mix? I mean... yeah... I guess that's fair. But this is a very unrealistic system.
From a practicality point of view, a $0.05 bag tax seems damn fair.
But if it does, that's fair enough.
If not, it's just another "because we said so" tax with little basis in reality.
In my county, the nickle is a reminder. The program costs the stores a penny to run, and it costs like two or three pennies/bag to run the regulations (I guess the agents who go around store-to-store to make sure that everyone is in compliance). So the county is only getting like a penny/bag in profit out of this. With 10-million bags used per year, that's like $100,000 in taxes, which is barely a rounding error on the budget.
The primary purpose is to remind people of the effects of pollution, not actually to create revenue. But its an effective means at curbing plastic-bag pollution at the source (people using fewer bags)
Only if you assume that the entity being taxed (in this case the consumer) is the one that can fix the problem at the lowest cost, and that the amount of the tax is the efficient amount, i.e., that it changes the consumer's incentives in exactly the right way to maximize the net gain to society as a whole.
I'm actually skeptical that either of these things are true even in this simple case (let alone in the many more complicated cases in which the same argument for taxes to "fix" market failures is made). I would guess that most people dispose of plastic grocery bags by throwing them in the trash. (In some places they may be recyclable, if so just substitute the recycler for the trash collector in what follows.) So the entity that probably knows the most about the costs of disposing of them is the trash collector. That is probably also the entity that can fix the externality at the lowest cost. So if we thought there was an uncaptured externality involved, it would make more sense to tax the trash collector based on the impact of the plastic bags as he disposes of them, and let him pass on the cost to the consumer in higher trash collection fees if necessary. And a tax of 5 cents per plastic bag seems too high for this method of taxation: in fact I'd be surprised of 1 cent per bag wasn't too high.
If there is a problem with plastic bag litter, it is the fault of the litterers, which is a subset of all users of plastic bags. Shifting what should be the liability of the polluters onto the entire population of plastic bag users doesn't right any wrong--in my view the wrong is even greater.
Yes. This is exactly why we don't expect markets to take care of these issues: instead, we have a public police force.
> If there is a problem with plastic bag litter, it is the fault of the litterers, which is a subset of all users of plastic bags. Shifting what should be the liability of the polluters onto the entire population of plastic bag users doesn't right any wrong--in my view the wrong is even greater.
The problem is that enforcing this liability is somewhere between impractical and impossible. It doesn't matter how much ideological sense your proposed solution makes if it can't actually be executed.
Markets can and do take care of these problems. Businesses employ loss prevention and security staff, install security cameras and do a myriad of other things to prevent these problems from happening. Furthermore, when preventative measures are not enough, insurance is also available.
Police officers do very little to prevent these kind of problems. I would guess that very few cases (percentage wise) of shoplifting or vandalism were actually prevented by an on duty police officer. In almost all crimes on property or person police only show up afterwards--if they show up at all.
>The problem is that enforcing this liability is somewhere between impractical and impossible. It doesn't matter how much ideological sense your proposed solution makes if it can't actually be executed.
Maybe so, depends on the case. If I have video footage of a neighbor dumping a plastic bag in my front yard, I can pursue it if I want. Perhaps the wind blew it into my tree from a careless person many miles away. If I wanted to, I could hire an expert to do forensics on the bag and track down the culprit. In reality when the cost is so low for me to go pick up the bag from my property, that's what I'll do. The point is, it's up to the property owner to determine how they want to handle a trespass on their property. It is a cost/benefit analysis and the markets are working just the way they should.
Yeah. Businesses pay for something. Consumers pay for them.
But unless you actually create a crime-fighting unit, then you have innocent people paying for the crimes of others.
Look, if you're going to go anarcho-capitalist, please at least do the correct response and talk about "Dispute Resolution Organizations" or voluntary "Arbitration Courts". Because talking about those anarcho-capitalist concepts at least demonstrates to me that you're following the argument.
>But unless you actually create a crime-fighting unit, then you have innocent people paying for the crimes of others.
So what? My local grocery store has a publicly accessible bathroom. Even though I may not go in and use the bathroom, I pay for other customers' use when I purchase a box of Cheerios.
>Look, if you're going to go anarcho-capitalist, please at least do the correct response and talk about "Dispute Resolution Organizations" or voluntary "Arbitration Courts". Because talking about those anarcho-capitalist concepts at least demonstrates to me that you're following the argument.
Perhaps you posted in the wrong thread because this thread wasn't even discussing private courts so I'm not sure what you're referring to when you talk about "following the argument".
Nice argument. I guess we're done here. If you want to debate about philosophy and morals with me, the bare minimum requirement is that you do care.
As noted before, the $0.05 bag tax is a very, very, very minor issue. It barely costs anything. Frankly, I'm surprised you cared enough to discuss the matter this long on an issue so mundane.
If you were to ask me how much I cared about this subject, I'd tell you straight up: about $0.05, the amount of "bag tax" in my county. I'm not asking for a miracle or anything here. I'm just saying this is clearly more fair for plastic-bag users to pay for the costs associated with their behavior (however small it is), rather than other people paying for it.
If you can demonstrate to me that using the bathroom at stores is a major enough concern that a tax is required, then we can discuss creating a tax on that behavior as well. Somehow, I bet you're being facetious.
I think you've taken it the wrong way. I truly have no idea what you're getting at. Just because the cost of me buying Cheerios includes the privileged of someone else using the bathroom, it does not denote a market failure.
You, seemingly, have taken the stance that a business hiring security personnel is a manifestation of a market failure. It's a non-sequitur.
No. My stance is that innocent-people pay for the crimes of others in your hypothetical.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_failure
In a perfectly efficient market, you only pay for what you use. The market failure occurs when you pay for things that OTHER people use. (IE: you get lung cancer when a Coal Power Plant burns Coal. Market failure, specifically an externality. You pay for lung cancer that was caused by other people.)
If you don't care about efficient markets, then you probably shouldn't call yourself an "ancap".
You say "No" but then you repeated what I stated in different terms. Yes, it's unfortunate that there are bad people in the world who do not respect the property of others. We take measures to mitigate those risks like putting locks on our doors. That does not denote a market failure. Measures taken to mitigate crimes against us surely cannot be considered paying for something you do not use.
When I purchase something from the store, I'm not just buying that item itself. I'm paying for all the costs necessary to get that item to me--which includes costs for operating a business. Me paying that costs does not equate paying for something I did not use--I did use it. I used that business in order to be delivered goods. They paid costs to ensure I would get the goods. No, market failure.
>IE: you get lung cancer when a Coal Power Plant burns Coal. Market failure, specifically an externality. You pay for lung cancer that was caused by other people.
As I've stated previously this is not a market failure because this example depends on the idea of the commons. This exemplifies the failure of the idea of the commons, but not the market.
>If you don't care about efficient markets, then you probably shouldn't call yourself an "ancap".
If you're truly interested in having a discussion about morality and theory, why not cut out all the pretentious, snide comments? In this entire discussion I have only been respectful.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_failure
> In economics, market failure is a situation in which the allocation of goods and services is not efficient. That is, there exists another conceivable outcome where an individual may be made better-off without making someone else worse-off
The store AND the consumers will be better off if a police force stopped the thefts.
This is the very definition of a market failure.
>The store AND the consumers will be better off if a police force stopped the thefts.
>This is the very definition of a market failure.
You continue to fallaciously claim that absent a public police force businesses would do nothing to stop theft. The claim is absurd and ignores measures that businesses already take today to stop thefts. Furthermore you fallaciously claim that a public police force would stop thefts. We have a public police force. Thefts still happen. You have provided no evidence that absent a public police force that there would at least be more thefts and that option would be Pareto inefficient.
Your argument is the very definition of a non-sequitur.
They will do something to stop theft, and this something will cost money. It will cost insurance, it will cost security cameras, or security guards.
And these costs will be passed onto the consumer by the store raising prices.
IE: Consumer loses. Business lose. Thieves win.
Market failure in a nutshell.
> Furthermore you fallaciously claim that a public police force would stop thefts
On the contrary. I suggest the police force as a deterrence. They help fix the problem, but the costs of a perfect police force are too great (both in civil liberties and in monetary costs).
So in practice, we settle for a medium were enough thieves get caught to deter crime, but not all thieves are caught.
Non-sequitur in a nutshell.
I have a far more nuanced argument than that.
Thieves win in your system more than they do in the status quo, because you somehow think that insurance companies / bouncers are sufficient to deter thefts.
A public police force is needed to deter thefts on a fair basis.
I won't go into the silliness of the assumption that our current public police force is "fair", but what makes you think a private police force/security guards/etc, would be less efficient at preventing theft than a public police force?
The fact that the concept of private jurisdiction is currently incompatible with US Values.
And finally, the fact that its a classic "Tragedy of the Commons" situation. Of course, you don't believe in that so what can I say? If one company's police force is effective, no other company will fund the police force. (At which point, the first company's police force will lose funding because why should only one company pay for the benefits of everyone else?)
Now assuming each company's private police force gets their own jurisdiction, then all you gotta do to commit a theft is to leave the jurisdiction of police forces. Just like what criminals did before the FBI was invented in the 1920s. Committed a crime in New York? Move to Florida, then commit another crime.
A system of a large-scale, cross-jurisdiction police force needs to be created to adequately solve the problem. (Ex: True, New York's NYPD will stop following you around, but the FBI will be on your tail).
And then we go back to the problem of the big "one jurisdiction police force", who pays for it?
Market failure. No one wants to pay for it, because everybody would rather be a freeloader. Because being a freeloader is the good and proper greedy way of getting things done.
Solution? Tax everybody, then use taxes to pay for the big cross-jurisdiction police force. This gives the opportunity for little police forces (and private security measures) to do their thing in the small scale.
I don't see the redundancy. Just because you have locks on your doors doesn't make my door locks redundant.
>The fact that the concept of private jurisdiction is currently incompatible with US Values.
That is true (depending on what you mean by "US Values"), but it tells us nothing of the efficiency of a theoretical system vs our current system.
>And finally, the fact that its a classic "Tragedy of the Commons" situation. Of course, you don't believe in that so what can I say? If one company's police force is effective, no other company will fund the police force.
While it would be hard to say exactly how a private police force would work because we can only work in hypotheticals and try to guess how the market might organize its efforts, I think it safe to say it would not work the way you're describing above. If you refuse to pay for police protection then you don't get it, just like any other private service. There is no commons. Some theorize that police protection (as well as fire, and possibly other services) would be included, or at least required, as part of insurance coverage.
>Now assuming each company's private police force gets their own jurisdiction, then all you gotta do to commit a theft is to leave the jurisdiction of police forces. Just like what criminals did before the FBI was invented in the 1920s. Committed a crime in New York? Move to Florida, then commit another crime.
Bounty hunters, for example, work across many jurisdictions. We also have cases in our current system of police where different jurisdictions work together, even across country boundaries. I don't see why the same thing couldn't happen with a private police force. Indeed, we see private businesses cooperating as a norm of their existence.
According to your objection, it sounds as if you find our current system of many jurisdictions at the planet level unsatisfactory. Do you favor a world-wide, singular government?
I suppose it's possible a thief could take a rocket ship to Mars, and ultimately it would be up to the individual doing the cost-benefit analysis on whether its worth it to pursue. In such a scenario are you in favor of a solar system-wide or intergalactic government?
You cared enough to discuss it this long- why does it surprise you someone else does too?
Perhaps it was more accurate for me to say, I'm surprised he stuck with this so long only to give up now.
Hypothetically, with plastic bags, maybe you were paying 6 cents per bag, through taxes, for the city to send people out to clean up litter. With a 5 cent tax, the cost is more obvious, but discourages everyone (including litterers) from using as many bags. With fewer bags to pick up, the city can spend less on cleaning crews (now easily covered by the 5 cent tax), and the 6 cents can go to something more productive. As a bonus, you've lowered the long-term environmental damage rate from bags that get away.
The thing is, the liability caused by the polluters was already on the entire population, whether or not they polluted, and even whether or not they used plastic bags at all. It feels worse (and more unfair) because you're made more aware of the costs involved, even though there's been an improvement in the overall situation (including for you, the non-polluter).
In the great scheme of things, yes. Although the definition kinda gets silly and I see your point. At the end of the day, you cannot trust the "free market" to solve vandalism or shoplifting.
You need to create a justice system, hire cops, and then use these cops to persecute vandals or other criminals. Under a free market devoid of crimefighting units, vandals and shoplifters will cause prices to rise (as stores increase prices to offset losses). IE: market failure. Otherwise innocent people are forced to pay for the crimes of others.
The creation of a police force requires innocent citizens to pay taxes for the police force as well. And the state will require the use of force to extort the money from these innocent citizens. So in the great scheme of things, the whole setup is extremely anti-market and demonstrates how much of a market failure the whole crime system is.
So from the perspective of "we can't trust only the free market to solve this problem", yes, Vandalism and Shoplifting require more than just straight capitalism to solve.
Most problems can be solved with capitalism btw. Which is why I'm generally a conservative on issues. But I educate myself on the failures of the free market so that I understand when we need to look at other solutions.
I'm mostly happy with the police system we have by the way. It seems like the "least bad". I see many issues, but I can't figure out a way to make the system better. And when I travel the world and look at other country's police systems, I'd much rather have the American system.
> If there is a problem with plastic bag litter, it is the fault of the litterers, which is a subset of all users of plastic bags. Shifting what should be the liability of the polluters onto the entire population of plastic bag users doesn't right any wrong--in my view the wrong is even greater.
Here's the primary difference: plastic bag pollution occurs even if you are 100% compliant with the law.
Plastic bags get thrown away into a dump, or otherwise discarded by some means. Then they degrade into micro-particles (since there's very few bacteria that can actually break down the bag), and then you start running into long-term pollution problems.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_pollution#Microdebris
Someone needs to pay for this. And naturally, making the users of the bags pay for this seems like the most fair solution.
See my above response. Markets do deal with vandalism and shoplifting, probably better than the police.
>You need to create a justice system, hire cops, and then use these cops to persecute vandals or other criminals. Under a free market devoid of crimefighting units, vandals and shoplifters will cause prices to rise (as stores increase prices to offset losses). IE: market failure. Otherwise innocent people are forced to pay for the crimes of others.
>The creation of a police force requires innocent citizens to pay taxes for the police force as well. And the state will require the use of force to extort the money from these innocent citizens. So in the great scheme of things, the whole setup is extremely anti-market and demonstrates how much of a market failure the whole crime system is.
Private police forces do exist. There are currently examples of this in Detroit where the public police is defunct. As for the court system, the closest thing I can think of in the private sector would be arbitration. There are theories out there of how the market might operate an entire court system. Just because these private systems are not more prevalent due to government monopolies does not denote a market failure.
>Here's the primary difference: plastic bag pollution occurs even if you are 100% compliant with the law.
>Plastic bags get thrown away into a dump, or otherwise discarded by some means. Then they degrade into micro-particles (since there's very few bacteria that can actually break down the bag), and then you start running into long-term pollution problems.
If the dump is incurring a cost by putting plastic bags into its landfill, than it behooves the dump to recuperate those costs from those consuming and throwing away those bags. If the dump's consumption of plastic bags is causing pollution to neighboring properties than the dump is liable.
This can all be handled with the market. No bans, and no taxes necessary.
Yeah. By making innocent people pay for the crimes of shoplifters, without actually fixing the shoplifters.
Shoplifters: Get free profit.
Consumers / Stores: Pay the cost.
That's hardly a solution, and you know it.
> Private police forces do exist
Generally speaking, we give monopoly powers of force to the Police. Private security forces are not allowed to use guns or tasers for example.
The effectiveness of unarmed security guards hired by insurance companies does jack-shit with regards to stopping a 7-11 gun-assisted theft.
And yes, I prefer that only trained officers have the legality to use guns in public places. Too many people shooting firemen in panic attacks: http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/16/us/maryland-firefighters-shot/...
> If the dump is incurring a cost by putting plastic bags into its landfill, than it behooves the dump to recuperate those costs from those consuming and throwing away those bags. If the dump's consumption of plastic bags is causing pollution to neighboring properties than the dump is liable.
Okay. The dump is owned by my county. And my county is now recuperating the costs by taxing the public. Congratulations. We're back at square one. Taxes are the fairest way of paying for this problem.
And if the dump is a private, 3rd party entity... how do you expect the dump to actually force people to pay for the services? Taxes man, they are the simplest solution.
>Generally speaking, we give monopoly powers of force to the Police. Private security forces are not allowed to use guns or tasers for example.
>The effectiveness of unarmed security guards hired by insurance companies does jack-shit with regards to stopping a 7-11 gun-assisted theft.
I'm not sure where this limitation of no guns for private security guards is coming from. I know plenty of private security guards who carry guns.
>Okay. The dump is owned by my county.
So you admit that what you were describing was a red herring and not a market failure.
>And if the dump is a private, 3rd party entity... how do you expect the dump to actually force people to pay for the services?
What do you mean "force people to pay for the services"? If I go to an accountant and use their services, I pay them for it. That's what we agreed to. If I didn't agree to pay him he wouldn't perform the service. Why would this be different? No force necessary.
Please. Explain.
Bob shoplift from a store. How does the insurance company stop him from shoplifing from the store again?
A Police Officer puts him in Jail. He spends some time thinking about it and eventually decides shoplifting isn't worth jailtime.
But private 3rd party citizens do NOT have the ability to use force on others. And that's a good thing.
Without the Police acting as a stick, you simply don't have a deterrence. Yes, Walmart hires greeters and purchases insurance policies against shoplifting. That doesn't stop the shoplifters I see shuffling through Walmart. If a Walmart greeter starts to confront a shoplifter, they just say "lol nope" and leave.
An Officer threating them with jail? That's something that gets a shoplifter's attention.
> So you admit that what you were describing was a red herring and not a market failure.
I'm saying that the County is using taxes to pay for the Dump (and similarly, raising a "bag tax" to discourage the use of plastic bags is a good thing). And according to you anarcho-capitalists, you guys typically consider the forceful removal of money from the private citizenry to be immoral.
I'm defending the use of taxes to solve this market failure. Because taxes are NOT a function of a free-market economy. You should know the basics of your own argument dude.
If you don't think raising taxes is a problem, then you have no qualms or counter-arguments from me. I'm presuming a few things about your argument because I've heard this philosophy many times before. I feel like cutting to the chase.
So, are you for or against taxes? I assume you're against, which is why I'm stating my arguments in this way.
When did I say an insurance company would stop a shoplifter? Whether or not Walmart will physically confront a shoplifter or not (I'm pretty sure I've seen cases in the news where they have), that's their business, but as far as I know there's nothing from precluding them from doing so.
>But private 3rd party citizens do NOT have the ability to use force on others.
Sure they do. I assume you're talking about laws here. I can't speak for the laws of every state, but most allow the the use of force in self defense or even to prevent theft.
Regardless of the laws of any given jurisdiction, is your argument that there is a market failure because the law prevents a business from taking action?
>I'm saying that the County is using taxes to pay for the Dump (and similarly, raising a "bag tax" to discourage the use of plastic bags is a good thing). And according to you anarcho-capitalists, you guys typically consider the forceful removal of money from the private citizenry to be immoral.
>I'm defending the use of taxes to solve this market failure. Because taxes are NOT a function of a free-market economy. You should know the basics of your own argument dude
You keep referring to an alleged market failure but you have failed to identify one. In your example the dump is a public institution, thereby excluding the possibility of a market failure.
Externality.
Plastic bags cost $0. Cleaning up plastic bags costs more than $0. If you can't grasp this basic concept, then that's your own fault at this point.
An externality is a basic market failure. Very basic economics here.
Very basic logic here.
And no. Plastic Bags cost $0 from the grocery store under normal circumstances. If it weren't for the bag tax of $0.05, I wouldn't be paying (or being discouraged) to use recyclable bags. Why would I buy a $1.00 reusable bag if all the plastic bags are free?
On the other hand, if plastic bags cost $0.05, then the reusable bag becomes useful within 20 trips to the grocery store (moreso, because in my experience, the reusable bags can hold two or three times as much. So maybe only in about 7 trips or so it makes up for it).
This reduced pollution and overall created a better situation for my municipality. Most importantly, the bag tax works as far as getting rid of plastic-bag pollution.
If you were actually familiar with the argument, you'd have made a sane counterargument by now. But instead, you've only claimed that this bag pollution example is "not a market failure" or "not an externality".
I do get that you want to play with definitions all day long, but I'm going to hammer this point until you come up with a cohesive argument.
---------------
If you disagree, please tell me the free-market approach. And explain why the free-market approach failed to occur for 40+ years straight (ie: until the creation of the bag tax).
Hint: there's no free-market enterprise who is going to be able to make money while cleaning up polluted rivers. In particular, no one can "profit" from the cleanup of the The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch
Very few people are even discouraging the use of plastic bags and plastic water bottles that contribute to the pollution.
Come on man, the environment is the CLASSIC market failure. The easiest way to deal with it is to incur a minor tax on plastic goods that end up in the patch, to discourage its growth.
But I get it, you didn't come up with the examples or the theories. The pseudo-economists did. I'm merely exposing the shallowness and contradictions of their theories.
You talk about "playing with definitions" but that's the entire point.
The cost of the bag is irrelevant. The cost of disposing the bag is irrelevant. The important facts are that the dump is a commons. That's it.
You ask for the solution and I have already told you the solution. Privatize the commons. It solves the entire problem. In this case you do not even have to privatize all the roads, national parks, oceans or anything else. In this case if the dump was privatized and municipalities did not try to take control of it through onerous regulation, your plastic bag disposal problem would be entirely solved.
>And explain why the free-market approach failed to occur for 40+ years straight
First of all I wanted to say thank you. Thank you for not saying "explain why the free-market failed for 40+ years straight". Your question acknowledges that you recognize that the free market did not fail but rather the free market approach was not attempted.
Why was it not attempted? I don't know. Not being very familiar with history of municipal garbage collection across countless jurisdictions, it would be hard for me to expound on their history and evolution. Similarly I don't know all the reasons why bad laws are passed and remain. I don't know why prohibition, despite its wondrous failure in the 1920s and early 1930s, continues in kind today. I could provide some anecdotes, but it wouldn't be the full picture.
But I do know if you look at the history of the world, free markets are a new concept. Free markets have brought incredible prosperity to the world. I know that, from the big picture, the world is trending towards more open and free markets. Perhaps in my day I'll see the widespread privatization of the dump.