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Showing posts from December 25, 2011

The Fallacy of Privatization: My Life As A Consultant

In the past few decades, the argument for privatization of practically every service normally run by public entities, such as cities, counties, states and even the federal government has been pushed by the Republican party.  The claim that private enterprises could do a better job for less expense has been a compelling one.  So compelling was this argument, that when presented to the public, there were few to question its logic, while the arguments of those few who did oppose things such as charter schools, privately run prisons and the construction of municipal facilities by private contractors fell upon deaf ears and were vocalized by mute politicians. Having worked in both the public and private sectors, I can honestly say that private contractors neither save more money, nor do they provide a better product in many cases.  Sometimes the shortcomings of contractors are only apparent in their failure to stay within a contracts budget.  At other times however, the failure are related