First efficiency is not an end in itself by default. There are other concerns like robustness, worst-case capability, values etc. The efficient way to provision many things is to not provision them. The efficient solution to poverty might be to let them all die.
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Second, it’s far better to have an apathetic, incompetent, inefficient state bureaucracy fulfilling a function than a crony capitalist efficiently, competently, and passionately pursuing self-interest against the public good.
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One reason free marketers often hate Coasean economics is that to be a Coasean is to recognize a) social costs b) the principal-agent problem of having a few profit-oriented firms in charge of a function where their agency allows them to hide social costs.
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Imagine if the response to the forest fires was to privatize firefighting. You can bet the first thing the crony capitalists would do is drive legislation declaring non-approved unlicensed AQI meters illegal and take over the EPA. Control your comp metrics. Hide externalities.
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It would naturally be a consortium of PE types who also own private prisons and wilderness interface real estate who bid for the firefighting business. They’d figure out a way to keep rich areas clean and avoid instrumenting poor areas with sensors.
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And then of course they’d financialize it somehow and sell subprime fire-risk bonds on international markets.
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The low-tech inefficiency of state agencies is often a feature. They are slightly likelier to fail in ways that randomizecthe social cost fallout. But really we need something better than markets and states for these social-cost-dominant problems.
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Any situation where it’s significantly easier to capture the upside and distribute the downside unevenly in hidden places full of people who can’t easily complain (crony oligarch high-capex sectors basically) needs a new kind of post-state/post-market solution.
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This is one reason I’m getting interested in low-cost networked sensors. Cellphone cameras have shown that low-cost sensor networks are the worst nightmare of both repressive states AND crony-capitalists. More sensors, more widely distributed. Sonic screwdrivers for everybody.
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Replying to @vgr
This is super interesting!! What are your thoughts on when sensors still aren't enough? Both policing and say, water in flint, both have trouble being challenged by lots of sensors
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Yeah it’s necessary not sufficient No idea where to go past that but it’s a starting point
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When I first heard the sousveillance pitch, I was like "ha ha nice idea but why would the state allow it?" and then smartphones happened. So we have the necessary conditions, and also some sousveillance success policing policing. Feels like a harbinger of a bigger shift.
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