In my neighborhood, I often see parcel delivery trucks from 5 different transport companies wasting energy to drive to the same homes on the same day.
This is unregulated capitalism.
Then comes trash day, and 1 company arrives with 1 garbage truck and empties all the trash cans in 1 go.
This is regulated capitalism.
The municipality decided only 1 company could win the garbage truck service job. They offer up the job every couple of years, 1 company wins, and we all save CO2 emissions.
@randahl This is a central argument in libertarianism. The state _should_ control access to limited resources and leave the rest be.
But what resources are _limited_? Suitable places to build bridges over rivers? Electromagnetic spectrum? Water/sewage? Internet fiber? Crop fields?
As a teenager I refered to myself as "right-wing anarchist" (that would be economic right, this is way before the current fascist right) which I long afterwards realized was known as (right) libertarianism. With age I've come to consider more and more things to be "limited" - and I consider the "nordic social democracy" to be a pretty good implementation of this.
@troed it is really difficult to define, and I think no matter where you draw the line, or is a trade-off.
In Denmark, most hospital capacity is run by the public regions, which means there is only one single hospital company. From an economic perspective, one would think that would completely ruin competition and quality, but our hospitals are far cheaper than the hospitals in the US, with a high quality too.
And there are zero harmful incentives to get customers to buy unneeded treatment.
Randahl Fink
Troed Sångberg