Well there it is, your enslavement to multinational corporations is complete. Kneel before your lizard overlords. Seriously, this is gonna cost you money out of your pay packet and affect services. What's next, privatisation of the police force, you think SYP is bad? A US judge just got sent down for selling people to a privately run prison This is what I mean by democracy being a fiction. http://www.wdm.org.uk/trade/eu-and-canada-push-through-‘anti-democratic’-trade-deal
Just watch any top level football match to see what a stranglehold corporations have over us. Coke,Mcdonalds,Barclays etc.etc.
True that though you choose to buy into that. No one forces that on you. if someone sues your gov for 20 billion, you get sued not the government it's your money not Cameron's or Osborne's or whoever. What happens is you may lose the ability to ban a product if the court decides your ban is unfair, AND get sued for lost profits. Pretty much like Monsanto is attempting sue the EU for banning their bee killing pesticides because they reckon it is not proven. Any deal that gives a foreign corp the ability to override the people you elected to run your country.. asking for trouble. I mean it is not an issue now because Cameron would just sell you out anyway, but if you ever elect a government with a spine then it becomes an issue.
I'd normally agree with you Tobes when The Lizardfinder General is on the prowl, but CETA is embodiment of the zealotry that the private sector always knows best - like when Major wouldn't allow the public bodies to bid for the franchises during rail franchises, yet here's one now making record profits with the highest customer and staff satisfaction in the country in East Coast, but again, thanks to free-market idolatry, it HAS to privatised before the next election. One of my sisters works in education, and another works in health (my ex is a nurse too) and all have seen the commercialisation/privatisation of services simply mean less staff, higher prices and bigger profits for shareholders, with astronomical wages for a few senior directors. We live in a mixed economy - private enterprise is essential, but even Adam Smith said some services should be run by the state.
The whole debate widens to all kinds of levels mate, but the basic premise of the private sector being able to challenge the closed shop of the public sector isn't abhorrent to me in principle at least.
Rail isn't a good example, as the Nation has been conditioned to see road costs as investment but rail costs as subsidy, so the 'market' in the privatised rail network has always been skewed.
The private v public sector debate is a red herring as it divides the working class and leads to a race to the bottom. The OP is about major corporations running/ruling the world as the ultra-rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
The Public/Private sector debate will continue so long as we have a mixed economy. There is no right or wrong. The private sector will always claim that they raise productivity and choice via greater efficiency. That argument is specious. The private sector is no more inherently efficient than well run public sector firms. What we do find however is that private sector firms tend to be far more short-termist than public sector organisations (in the public sector its the politicians that are short-termist!).
Well let me take you to my world on the railways and see if you can find well run private ones. Edit: They do still make profits for their shareholders and always have enough money to donate to the Tories, so by that standard they are 'well run', even if they cost the taxpayer twice as much as BR did even accounting for inflation.
But I know that "such an entity" does NOT exist in the private sector! If you want an example of well run public sector organisations then perhaps the CEGB and Nuclear Electric could be forwarded as prime examples - however look at the basket cases they became once Thatcher privatised them!!
There are many reasons for public works but efficiency is never one of them. There are some industries and services that are better suited to public institutions and others better suited to private industry. The problem with private rail is that they essentially become monopolies so might as well be government ran they're just as inefficient. They might as well be public. Industry where private competition could exist, it should exist. It almost always works out better for the consumer and the public.
That's just not true and a very myopic view of the economic benefits of both private sector organisations and the value of competition. The history of the 20th century - especially in the US - shows us that supposedly successful organisations become bloated and inefficient (whilst arguing that they are 'closing in' on the benefits of economies of scale). Those same organisations also clearly demonstrate that the private sector finds competition an anathema as they constantly seek monopolistic or oligopolistic positions. Take the blinkers off when it comes to efficiency and the private sector the differences between the 2 sectors is far closer thank you would like to think. The big problem for the public sector lies not generally with the operational management (which tends to be good) but with political control that is exercised over them.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Things-They-Dont-About-Capitalism/dp/0141047976 Essential reading for anyone brainwashed into thinking the private sector is the panacea for everything
It's true of any industry though. Think of everything you interact with and what industries work and what doesn't. Most unpopular industries are usually things like rail. Like cable. Like energy provider. Why is that? Lack of competition in those industries! You can see it everyday in the companies you interact with. Some things shouldn't be privatised if they exclude people or restrict people's social mobility. Education. Healthcare. Police. National Security. Infrastructure. Things which are for the social good and wellbeing of the population. But yes... almost every industry people universally hate are normally run by monopolies be they government or private monopolies. Put the political crap and ideology aside; just think about what industries suck in your life for proof.
Your just too hung up on the supposed benefits of competition! As a driver for invention and change, competition died with the advent of globalisation. The major challenge to the Western democracies and their economies is to define another driver. The wholesale rape of the Western economies for globalisation has not added one iota of true wealth to the global economy. Quite the opposite all of the Western economies are now far poorer as they have lost skills and facilities that will be probably too costly to re-import.
That's a pretty good assessment Dave Competition is a farce anyway, every major industry has been caught price fixing. Competition is many aspects is false, they just divide the market up. They those at the top of the cororate ladder lobby government with wads of cash to monopolise the system to maintain dominance.
