I am always wary of a notion such as efficiency but if you mean simply that state enterprises can offer as good service for the same cost as private enterprises it seems to me that is too kind to private enterprise to claim only that state enterprises can be as efficient as private enterprises. The state enterprise need not make a profit so other things being equal can offer better service for the same price.
In Canada this is evident in the relative costs for auto insurance in jurisdictions that have monopoly govt. auto insurance such as Saskatchewan and Manitoba and those that do not. Studies show that insurance rates in most instances are cheaper in the state monopoly jurisdictions than in those with competing private auto insurance jurisdictions such as Ontario.
One huge advantage for provinces in having state enterprises is that they prevent jurisdictions being under the complete domination of private interests. A good example is oil development in Alberta. There are no govt. owned developers. When the Alberta govt. recently increased royalties private enterpreneurs simply shifted investment to lower royalty provinces such as Saskatchewan next door. If there were Alberta govt. owned developers they could simply take up the slack and private developers would think twice about continually threatening a pullout of capital. They would fear being muscled out of the play by the govt. players.
cheers, k hanly
Blog: http://kenthink7.blogspot.com/index.html Blog: http://kencan7.blogspot.com/index.html
--- On Sun, 12/28/08, dredmond at efn.org <dredmond at efn.org> wrote:
> From: dredmond at efn.org <dredmond at efn.org>
> Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] State run shit?
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Date: Sunday, December 28, 2008, 7:06 PM
> On Sat, December 27, 2008 4:40 pm, Kevin Robert Dean wrote:
>
> > So I see a lot of articles like this one
> >
> http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3c301096-d37b-11dd-989e-000077b07658.html
> >
> > LBOer out with counterpoints? Or are "state run
> enterprises" just
> > a form of "State Capitalism" and not
> anything like a 'socialist' (or
> > community based, whatever you want to call it) run
> enterprise would be
> > like?
>
> Bit late getting to this - the state is a zone of
> contradiction, so state
> enterprises aren't necessarily progressive or
> regressive. You have to look
> at the structure of the state, whose interests it serves,
> and whose it
> doesn't.
>
> That said, (1) state-run enterprises can be as efficient
> and innovative as
> private ones, and (2) they are a key ingredient of any
> developmental
> state. This is important, considering 80% of humanity lives
> in
> semiperipheries or true peripheries, places which badly
> need developmental
> states.
>
> I have an appendix of state-owned businesses in East Asia
> at the end of
> this webpage: http://www.efn.org/~dredmond/keiretsu.html
> Very old data, I'm afraid, haven't had time to
> update, but it gives a
> sense of the potential scale and scope of state-linked biz.
>
> -- DRR
>
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