Public vs Corporate vs Private Enterprise

There is allot of Ideological rubbish in the debate about public vs private enterprise.
Let me state at the outset that I am not against private enterprise. In fact, I believe it is the backbone of freedom of the individual, and an effective vehicle for innovation.

In it's most basic form private enterprise is the sole operator offering his/her skills direct to the user. As the scale of operation increases we get partnerships and private companies. These businesses have direct feedback from the customer to the ownership. The owners are directly affected by the success or failure of their own efforts. The natural tendency is to good service at a fair price. This of course is no guarantee as, with every aspect of society, there are some greedy and shonky people involved.

I won't include joint stock companies (publicly listed companies on stock exchanges) as these entities are not strictly private enterprise. I will use the term "corporate." The owners of the business are normally not the operators/workers of the business, they are mostly anonymous investors who's motivating interest is profit. These entities attract the most rapacious individuals into management, who then strip as much remuneration as they can from the business, without any real risk. In fact we have seen many instances where some incompetent CEO and team totally ruin the business yet still end up with the "golden handshake." They also have a tendency to use their board positions to "buy" favours from the political sphere. How many companies have ex politicians on the board?
These structures have the ability to develop into immensely powerful, trans national, economic nodes. This creates distortion in the free operation of both the economy and politics.


Public enterprise has been under concerted attack by the corporate sector eager to get it's hands on the assets and the possibility of monopoly inflated profits. Public sector enterprises when properly resourced and managed have been a very cost effective deliverer of services. They have also been used to set standards for the private and corporate sectors, helping to reign in some of the excesses. They also have been used to train workers to a high standard, as quality was regarded as more important than cost cutting. Many of these well trained workers were then snapped up by the private sector. This training role has been undervalued in the private/ public debate. Public sector enterprise is also ideally suited for the provision of "caring" services. Health, welfare, education etc. In these requirements of the population, to have profit as the primary motivation of the provider, is to virtually guarantee cost cutting leading to poor service provision. Too few nurses to do a proper job, poor facilities, heartless administration, etc, etc. We hear of these atrocities all the time.
Unfortunately most of our Governments have been captured by the Corporate Sector and are busily selling off all the best public assets, often way under value, and underfunding the rest to prepare the public, through discontent with the declining service, for the inevitable sale.

More on Intent

Intent does not have to be anything especially lofty. Say for instance in the public service. The sort of intent that would be great for everyone would be "Do the best we can for our employers, the citizenry that we are here to serve." We all know how much better it is when we deal with someone who is trying their best to help us through the sometimes obtuse workings of government. Contrast that to the officious, by the book, cover their arse type.

The helpful leaves one feeling good about at least the people of the system. The officious leaves one feeling oppressed by a heartless Government that is there for some other reason than servicing the needs of the population.

If the belief of all, or at least a large majority, of the public sector, from top to bottom, was that their function is to service the needs of the population to the best of their ability, not filling in time till payday, not career boosting, not sucking up to the boss,not having to get their own way, not doing special deals, etc., then outcomes will be great. The 'willingness to help-ers' add friendly flexibility and easy outcomes. Whereas the 'rigid rulers', the 'slackers' and the 'bent' are inherently hostile, and toxic to the system.

When we look at Business this becomes even more apparent. As with the Government's role of providing services, so it is with Business . Business exists to provide for the needs of the people.
Many successful businesses have been built on the principals of good service and a fair price.
Unfortunately, Business has largely been corrupted. Some by greed and some by belief and misunderstanding. The joint stock company is largely to blame. The belief associated with these entities is that their task is to maximise profits for the shareholders. This attracts the more predatory individuals, who in the process make sure that they are WELL paid. Gone is the servicing the needs of the population as the primary goal. This belief has an internal logic that requires the doing of less for more, the antithesis of what it should be. Once again we have the example of the GFC.