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Patrick,
I have already said all I have to say about the
math issue vis a vis this matter, so let's stick to
verbalizations by Samuelson.
In an earlier post I quoted Samuelson directly
from his original article. I shall not quote directly again,
but simply restate. I fully agree that his upfront definition
is rather vague. But in his discussion of why he saw a
problem for the "spontaneous decentralized solution," he
posited the possibility of everybody internalizing somehow
a bureaucrat's optimal solution, but then rejects this on the
basis that individuals will be able to "snatch some selfish
benefits" by departing from such behavior. Again, I see
this as arising not from non-rivalry, but indeed from non-
excludability, even if Samuelson did not use this terminology
or proceed to analyze all kinds of property rights solutions
to this problem. Do you see this terminology on his part
as posing anything other than the non-excudability problem?
I remind that Samuelson admits that it may be that few
goods fit the polar cases he described and analyzed. However,
I think many of us feel that this polar categorization was worthwhile
because it did highlight certain essential aspects of the problem.
Indeed, I would submit that the Samuelsonian analysis is
still useful even in a purely privatized world of clubs which form
to provide goods or services that have some kind of (purely
local presumably) "collective" aspect (if I dare use that word
at all). Thus, we have gated communities providing their own
law and order, as well as streets, etc. I gather this is the sort of
thing that you have in mind, right, that Samuelson and I and
everybody else should have open minds about, right? So,
even in such a world, the question arises as to how the gated
community is to decide how much it is to spend on hiring the
private police who guard their gates and enforce the restrictive
covenants and anti-noise rules that the gated community adopts?
Samuelson's argument that it should be the sum of the
willingnesses to pay of those involved still seems to be the
relevant solution. What other is there?
Now you pose as a way of ejecting someone from being
defended against a life-destroying nuclear attack (or from a
life-destroying asteroid hit), putting them in jail or killing them.
Now, I grant, that threatening such actions might well induce
them to pay up to the private provider of such defenses. But
these will still not prevent the from being protected
against a life-destroying nuclear attack (or a life-destroying
asteroid hit), although killing them would make the whole issue
moot. But, I note that authorities that have the right
to kill people are known as states and do so according
to laws. A private entity that abrogates to itself the right to
kill people that do not go along with group decisions about
the provision of goods would certainly be a state for all practical
purposes, even if it called itself something else.
Finally, with regard to the nuclear war example. It is
certainly true that the original rationale for nuclear weapons
arose in a context of "us against them," in which presumably
somebody could be made to not be "defended" by expelling
them from the country (in which case, they would probably not
be subject to nuclear attack anyway). But, because of ignorance
and prisoners' dilemma problems we ended up with a situation
where deterring a nuclear attack in fact meant deterring against
a globally life-destroying event. Nobody can be excluded from
the benefits of that, as long as nuclear arsenals and their delivery
systems remain large enough to bring about such an outcome.
Even those who are killed by the state are still not excluded from
being defended against such attack (or their posthumous remains).
BTW, I think that this will be my last post on this topic,
unless something especially new or insightful is said.
Barkley Rosser
James Madison University
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