Public transport, water and sewage systems, infrastructure like roads and bridges are more of a hybrid model with a strong planning component, and private contractors (who consume a lot of public funds and often misuse them).
Meaning, I think that ticket sales can a good job of capturing the costs and benefits of transportation - the benefits to the consumer and the costs to the producer. It’s worked well in other areas of transportation, like passenger boats and planes, and the market mostly works well in those areas.
So I’d have guessed that issue with subways, different from planes and ships, is that you have to buy the rights to large portions of underground land in order to build your lines in contiguous fashion. It’s hard for private developers to get the rights to these lands, if one landowner refuses to sell, it can block the construction of an entire line. This is why rail, dam, and highway projects tend to be coordinated by the state. They all suffer this problem, which doesn’t apply to transport by air or sea, as air and sea lack similar private property issues to trip over.
Long-term payoffs that increase the value of all participants in society, such as education, healthcare, infrastructure (roads including public transportation, water, electricity, ...), are demonstrably better served by government than by business.
Example: the UK's privatisation of water utilities. The UK's water now exist to turn government handouts into dividends while providing as little practical value as possible.
This is not hyperbole. The industry literally dumps shit in the UK's rivers to save operating expenses, and has built zero new reservoirs since privatisation.
> definition of 'perfect competition' perfect competition, in which there are large numbers of identical suppliers and demanders of the same product, buyer and sellers can find one another at no cost, and no barriers prevent new suppliers from entering the market.
And that perfect competition provides the price signals that allow the market to be more competitive.
The less that holds true, the less efficient the market is going to be.
What is the price signal on education?
What is the price signal on public infrastructure?
What is the price signal on rule of law and the ability to enforce contracts?
