roundtable: Re: $100 Billion Giveaway

roundtable: Re: $100 Billion Giveaway

Re: $100 Billion Giveaway

stefan w. schmitz (h8851881@miraculix.wu-wien.ac.at)
Tue, 17 Oct 1995 14:02:45 +0100 (MET) 

From: "stefan w. schmitz" <h8851881@miraculix.wu-wien.ac.at>
Message-Id: <199510171302.AA14166@miraculix.wu-wien.ac.at>
Subject: Re: $100 Billion Giveaway
To: roundtable@cni.org
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 1995 14:02:45 +0100 (MET)
In-Reply-To: <951014044902_73949818@mail02.mail.aol.com> from "RznDemoPM@aol.com" at Oct 14, 95 04:49:08 am


In the discussion about the preservation of the public benefits from 
the use of airwaves the term "public good" was used in way which is not 
coherent. They are defined, amongst economists and political scientists, 
as goods that are characterised by a legal and a physical peculiarity.

The legal one is non-excludability and the physical one is non-rivalery 
in consumption.

Airwaves cannot be regarded as public good since the lack the physical
peculiarity of non-rivalery in consumption. One program or information 
at a time can be transmitted on one airwave or wave-length.

It is true though that the excludability is not given in that case and
that's where the government comes into play. It can ensure excludability 
through legal construction. 

It is this "service" the government can auction off. These funds can 
be the basis for a politically agreed on public benefit program. These 
program should be designed such that maximum accessability is ensured. 
Hence, a decentralized open network seems to be the apropriate 
institution to avoid beaurocracy and de-democratization.

Stefan


Stefan Schmitz
<h8851881@miraculix.wu-wien.ac.at>


> > > Stefan Schmitz writes:
> > 
> > Hi!
> >
> > I just read your $100 billion giveaway mail. How come that anyone claims
> > ownership of airwaves? Not even the government can say it owns them. 
> 
> Quite true.  They are what's known as a public trust.  No one can own 
> them.  And thus, since the government doesn't own the airwaves, it can't 
> auction them off either.  What it can -- and ought to -- do is preserve 
> them as a public resource to be used in the public interest.  Public 
> benefit non-profits are the most natural vehicle for this in the existing 
> scheme of things.  They are regularly used to manage public trusts in the 
> arts, education, conservation, etc.
> 
> Ownership of property is just one model of social organization.  It 
> certainly has its place.  But natural public goods -- air, water, and 
> spectrum among them -- do not fit that model very well.  Back in the 
> 20's, even conservatives like Herbert Hoover realized this.  
> 
> Paul Rosenberg
> Reason & Democracy
> RznDemo@aol.com

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