Furious Political Agenda

[athelind]

Jim Hightower pretty much sums up my attitude on the whole "Run Government Like A Business" idea.

I'm not a "customer", dammit, I'm a citizen.

Comments

[silussa.livejournal.com]

The folks that want government run like a business....have never worked inside a business. It's a frightening thing, the minor little insanities.

I'd rather government was a bit more efficient then that.

[araquan.livejournal.com]

What most people fail to realize is that government agencies exist, generally, to provide a service. They have no other reason for being, barring the (not so) occasional bit of porkbarreling. Businesses, on the other hand, exist for the sole purpose of making money. The service or product they provide is merely a means to that end. And there's nothing wrong with this in principle, but it means that monetary concerns will almost always come before concerns about quality and ubiquity of service. I find it amusing that some people would like to hand the USPS off to UPS or FedEx, for example- whenever I have something shipped to me I almost always try to have it shipped via the mail. I've never had a package maimed, misrouted, misdirected, tampered with, or even outright lost via the mail... Both UPS and FedEx have managed to do ALL of these things. The only private courier I've found to be as trustworthy as the Post Office is Airborne Express, and they aren't exactly cheap to use. I never did understand from where came the idea that everything- even government agencies- have to make money, but it must be pointed out that UPS and FedEx don't deliver to every address in the country every day. I wonder how profitable they would be- or how far service would have to degrade to ensure profitability- if they had to handle all postal routes, including those pesky rural ones. There's a reason FedEx spawned a Home Delivery division- and there's a reason that division's service is absolutely atrocious. And the mail is just one example of someplace where I'm convinced that privatization would be folly...