Social ownership

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Social ownership is any of various forms of ownership for the means of production in socialist economic systems, encompassing public ownership, employee ownership, cooperative ownership, citizen ownership of equity, common ownership and collective ownership. Historically social ownership implied that capital and factor markets would cease to exist under the assumption that market exchanges within the production process would be made redundant if capital goods were owned by a single entity or network of entities representing society, but the articulation of models of market socialism where factor markets are utilized for allocating capital goods between socially owned enterprises broadened the definition to include autonomous entities within a market economy. Social ownership of the means of production is the common defining characteristic of all the various forms of socialism.

 The two major forms of social ownership are society-wide public ownership and cooperative ownership. The distinction between these two forms lies in the distribution of the surplus product. With society-wide public ownership, the surplus is distributed to all members of the public through a social dividend, whereas with co-operative ownership the economic surplus of an enterprise is controlled by all the worker-members of that specific enterprise.

The goal of social ownership is to eliminate the distinction between the class of private owners who are the recipients of passive property income and workers who are the recipients of labor income (wages, salaries and commissions), so that the surplus product (or economic profits in the case of market socialism) belong either to society as a whole or to the members of a given enterprise. Social ownership would enable productivity gains from labor automation to progressively reduce the average length of the working day instead of creating job insecurity and unemployment. Reduction of necessary work time is central to the Marxist concept of human freedom and overcoming alienation, a concept widely shared by Marxist and non-Marxist socialists alike.

The term "socialization" refers to the process of restructuring the economic framework, organizational structure and institutions of an economy on a socialist basis. The comprehensive notion of socialization and the public ownership form of social ownership implies an end to the operation of the laws of capitalism, capital accumulation and the use of money and financial valuation in the production process, along with a restructuring of workplace-level organization.

Objectives

Social ownership is variously advocated to end the Marxian concept of exploitation, to ensure that income distribution reflects individual contributions to the social product, to eliminate unemployment arising from technological change, to ensure a more egalitarian distribution of the economy's surplus, or to create the foundations for a non-market socialist economy.

In Karl Marx's analysis of capitalism, social ownership of the means of production emerges in response to the contradictions between socialized production and private appropriation of surplus value in capitalism. Marx argued that productivity gains arising from the substitution of variable capital (labor inputs) for constant capital (capital inputs) would cause labor displacement to outstrip the demand for labor. This process would lead to stagnant wages and rising unemployment for the working class alongside rising property income for the capitalist class, further leading to an over-accumulation of capital. Marx argued that this dynamic would reach a point where social ownership of the highly automated means of production would be necessitated to resolve this contradiction and resulting social strife. Thus the Marxist case for social ownership and socialism is not based on any moral critique of the distribution of property income (wealth) in capitalism, but rather the Marxist case for socialism is based on a systematic analysis of the development and limits of the dynamic of capital accumulation.

For Marx, social ownership would lay the foundations for the transcendence of the capitalist law of value and the accumulation of capital, thereby creating the foundation for socialist planning. The ultimate goal of social ownership of productive property for Marx was to expand the "realm of freedom" by shortening average work hours so that individuals would have progressively larger portion of their time to pursue their genuine and creative interests. Thus the end goal of social ownership is the transcendence of the Marxist concept of alienation.

The economist David McMullen identifies five major benefits of social ownership, where he defines it as society-wide ownership of productive property: first, workers would be more productive and have greater motivation since they would directly benefit from increased productivity, secondly this ownership stake would enable greater accountability on the part of individuals and organizations, thirdly social ownership would eliminate unemployment, fourth it would enable the better flow of information within the economy, and finally it would eliminate wasteful activities associated with "wheeling and dealing" and wasteful government activities intended to curb such behavior and deal with unemployment.

From a non-Marxist, market socialist perspective, the clearest benefit of social ownership is an equalization of the distribution of property income, eliminating the vast disparities in wealth that arise from private ownership under capitalism. Property income (profit, interest and rent) is distinguished from labor income (wages and salaries) which in a socialist system would continue to be unequal based on one's marginal product of labor – social ownership would only equalize passive property income.

Notable non-Marxist and Marxist socialist theorists alike have argued that the most significant argument for social ownership of the means of production is to enable productivity gains to ease the work burden for all individuals in society, resulting in progressively shorter hours of work with increasing automation and thus a greater amount of free time for individuals to engage in creative pursuits and leisure.

Criticism of private ownership

Social ownership is contrasted with the concept of private ownership of the means of production, promoted as a solution to what its proponents see as being inherent issues to private ownership. Market socialists and non-market socialists therefore have slightly different conceptions of social ownership. The former believe that private ownership and private appropriation of property income is the fundamental issue with capitalism, and thus believe that the process of capital accumulation and profit-maximizing enterprise can be retained, with their profits being used to benefit society in the form of a social dividend. By contrast, non-market socialists argue that the major problems with capitalism arise from its contradictory economic laws that make it unsustainable and historically limited. Therefore, social ownership is seen as a component of the establishment of non-market coordination and alternative "socialist laws of motion" that overcome the systemic issues of capital accumulation.

The socialist critique of private ownership is heavily influenced by the Marxian analysis of capitalist property forms as part of its broader critique of alienation and exploitation in capitalism. Although there is considerable disagreement among socialists about the validity of certain aspects of Marxian analysis, the majority of socialists are sympathetic to Marx's views on exploitation and alienation. Socialists critique the private appropriation of property income on the grounds that because such income does not correspond to a return on any productive activity and is generated by the working class, it represents exploitation. The property-owning (capitalist) class lives off passive property income produced by the working population by virtue of their claim to ownership in the form of stock, bonds or private equity. This exploitative arrangement is perpetuated due to the structure of capitalist society. From this perspective, capitalism is regarded as class system akin to historical class systems like slavery and feudalism.

Private ownership has also been criticized on ethical grounds by the economist James Yunker. Yunker argues that because passive property income requires no mental or physical exertion on the part of the recipient and because its appropriation by a small group of private owners is the source of the vast inequalities in contemporary capitalism, this establishes the ethical case for social ownership and socialist transformation.

Socialization as a process

Socialization is conceived as a process that transforms the economic processes and, by extension, the social relations within an economy. As such, it is distinct from the process of "nationalization" which does not necessarily imply a transformation of the organizational structure of organizations or the transformation of the economic framework under which economic organizations operate.

Marxists envision socialization as a restructuring of social relations to overcome alienation, replacing hierarchical social relations within the workplace with an association of members.

Socialization debates

During the 1920s, socialists in Austria and Germany were engaged in a comprehensive dialogue about the nature of socialization and how a program of socialization could be effectively carried out. Austrian scientific thinkers whose ideas were based on Ernst Mach's empiricist notion of energy and technological optimism, including Josef Popper-Lynkeus and Carl Ballod, proposed plans for rational allocation of exhaustible energy and materials through statistical empirical methods. This conception of non-capitalist calculation involved the use of energy and time units, the latter being viewed as the standard cardinal unity of measurement for socialist calculation. These thinkers belonged to a technical school of thought called "scientific utopianism", which is an approach to social engineering that explores possible forms of social organization.

The most notable thinker belonging to this school of thought was the Viennese philosopher and economist Otto Neurath, whose conception of socialism as a natural, non-monetary economic system became widespread within the socialist movement following the end of World War I. Neurath's position was held in contrast to other socialists in this period, including the revisionist perspective stemming from Eduard Bernstein, the orthodox social democratic perspective of Karl Kautsky, the Austro-Marxism models of labor-time calculation from Otto Bauer and the emerging school of neoclassical market socialism. Neurath's position opposed all models of market socialism because it rejected the use of money, but was also held in contrast with the more orthodox Marxist conception of socialism held by Karl Kautsky, where socialism only entails the elimination of money as capital along with super-session of the process of capital accumulation.

Otto Neurath conceptualized a comprehensive view of socialization during the socialization debates. "Total socialization" involved not only a form of ownership but also the establishment of economic planning based on calculation in kind, and was contrasted with "partial socialization". "Partial socialization" involved the use of in-kind calculation and planning within a single organization, which externally operated within the framework of a monetary market economy. Neurath's conception of socialism was the initial point of criticism of Ludwig Von Mises in the socialist calculation debate.

In the subsequent socialist calculation debates, a dichotomy between socialists emerged between those who argued that socialization entailed the end of monetary valuation and capital markets, and those who argued that monetary prices could be used within a socialized economy. A further distinction arose between market socialists who argued that social ownership can be achieved within the context of a market economy, where worker-owned or publicly owned enterprises maximized profit and those who argued that socially owned enterprises operate according to other criteria, like marginal cost pricing.

Typology

Social ownership and socialization is categorically distinct from the process of nationalization. In most cases, "socialization" is understood to be a deeper process of transforming the social relations of production within economic organizations as opposed to simply changing titles of ownership. In this sense, "socialization" often involves both a change in ownership and a change in organizational management, including self-management or some form of workplace democracy in place of a strict hierarchical form of control. More fundamentally, social ownership implies that the surplus product (or economic profits) generated by publicly owned enterprise accrues to all of society – state ownership does not necessarily imply this.

Fundamentally, there are two major forms of "social ownership". The first is society-wide public ownership by an entity or network of entities representing society. The second major form of social ownership is employee-owned cooperative enterprise, with the members of each individual enterprise being co-owners of their organization. These possibilities give rise to a socialization dilemma, faced by advocates of public ownership: if social ownership is entrusted exclusively to state agents, then it is liable to bureaucratization; if it is entrusted exclusively to workers, then it is liable to monopoly power and abuse of market position.

Additionally, there are two major forms of management or "social control" for socially owned organizations, both of which can exist alongside the two major modes of social ownership. The first variant of control is public management, where enterprises are run by management held accountable to an agency representing the public either at the level of national, regional or local government. The second form of social control is worker self-management, where managers are elected by the member-workers of each individual enterprise or enterprises are run according to self-directed work processes.

The exact forms of social ownership vary depending on whether or not they are conceptualized as part of a market economy or as part of a non-market planned economy.

Public ownership

Public ownership can exist both within the framework of a market economy and within the framework of a non-market planned economy. In market socialist proposals, public ownership takes the form of state-owned enterprises that acquire capital goods in capital markets and operate to maximize profits, which are then distributed among the entire population in the form of a social dividend. In non-market models of socialism, public ownership takes the form of a single entity or a network of public entities coordinated by economic planning. A contemporary approach to socialism involves linking together production and distribution units by modern computers to achieve rapid feedback in the allocation of capital inputs to achieve efficient economic planning.

The economist Alec Nove defines social ownership as a form of autonomous public ownership, drawing a distinction between state-owned and directed enterprises. Nove advocates for the existence of both forms of enterprise in his model of feasible socialism.

Public ownership was advocated by neoclassical socialist economists during the interwar socialist calculation debate, most notable Oskar Lange, Fred M. Taylor, Abba P. Lerner and Maurice Dobb.

Neoclassical market socialist economists in the latter half of the 20th century who advocated public ownership highlighted the distinction between "control" and "ownership". John Roemer and Pranab Bardhan argued that public ownership, meaning a relatively egalitarian distribution of enterprise profits, does not require state control – Publicly owned enterprises can be controlled by agents who don't represent the state.

David McMullen's concept of decentralized non-market socialism advocates social ownership of the means of production, believing it to be far more efficient than private ownership. In his proposal, property titles would be replaced by "usership" rights and the exchange of capital goods would no longer be possible. Market exchange in capital goods would be replaced by internal transfers of resources, but an internal and decentralized price system would be fundamental to this systems' operation.

However, by itself public ownership is not socialist as it can exist under a wide variety of different political and economic systems. State ownership by itself does not imply social ownership where income rights belong to society as a whole. As such, state ownership is only one possible expression of public ownership, which itself is one variation of the broader concept of social ownership.

Social ownership of equity

The social ownership of capital and corporate stock have been proposed in the context of a market socialist system, where social ownership is achieved either by having a public body or employee-owned pension funds own corporate stock. 

The American economist John Roemer developed a model of market socialism that features a form of public ownership where individuals receive a non-transferable coupon entitling them to a share of the profits generated by autonomous non-governmental publicly owned enterprises. In this model, "social ownership" refers to citizen ownership of equity in a market economy.

James Yunker argues that public ownership of the means of production can be achieved in the same way private ownership is achieved in modern capitalism, using the shareholder system that effectively separates management from ownership. Yunker posits that social ownership can be achieved by having a public body, designated the Bureau of Public Ownership (BPO), own the shares of publicly listed firms without affecting market-based allocation of capital inputs. Yunker termed this model Pragmatic market socialism and argued that it would be at least as efficient as modern-day capitalism while providing superior social outcomes as public ownership would enable profits to be distributed among the entire population rather than going largely to a class of inheriting rentiers.

An alternative form of social ownership of equity is ownership of corporate stock through wage earner funds and pension funds. The underlying concept was first expounded upon in 1976 by the management theorist Peter Drucker, who argued that pension funds could reconcile employees' need for financial security with capital's need to be mobile and diversified, referring to this development as "pension fund socialism". In Sweden during the late 1970s, the Meidner program was advanced by the Swedish Social Democratic Party as a way to socialize enterprises through employee wage earners' funds, which would be used to purchase corporate stock. Rudolf Meidner's original plan was to require Swedish companies over a certain size to issue shares equal to 20 percent of profits, which would be owned by wage-earner funds controlled by employees through their trade unions. This plan was rejected and a watered-down proposal was adopted in 1984, which left corporate decision making just as it was and limited the scope of employee ownership to less than 3.5% of listed company shares in 1990.

Cooperative ownership

Cooperative ownership is the organization of economic units into enterprises owned by their workforce (workers cooperative) or by customers who use the products of the enterprise (this latter concept is called a consumer cooperative). Cooperatives are often organized around some form of self-management, either in the form of elected managers held accountable to the workforce, or in the form of direct management of work processes by the workers themselves. Cooperatives are often proposed by proponents of market socialism, most notably by the economists Branko Horvat, Jaroslav Vanek and Richard Wolff. 

Cooperative ownership comes in various forms, ranging from direct workers' ownership, employee stock ownership plans through pension funds, to the weakest version involving profit sharing. Profit-sharing and varying degrees of self-management or "Holacracy" is practiced in many of the high-technology companies of Silicon Valley.

The earliest model of cooperative socialism is mutualism, proposed by the French anarchist philosopher Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. In this system, the state would be abolished and economic enterprises would be owned and operated as producer cooperatives, with worker-members compensated in labor vouchers.

The model of market socialism promoted in the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was based on what was officially called "social ownership", involving an arrangement where workers of each firm each became members and joint-owners and managed their own affairs in a system of workers' self-management. 

Contemporary proponents of cooperative ownership cite higher motivation and performance in existing cooperatives. Critics argue that cooperative ownership by itself does not resolve the structural issues of capitalism like economic crises and the business cycle, and that cooperatives have an incentive to limit employment in order to boost the income of existing members.

Commons and peer-to-peer

In the context of non-market proposals, social ownership can include holding the means of producing wealth in common (common ownership), with the concept of "usership" replacing the concept of ownership. Commons-based peer production involves the distribution of a critical mass of inputs and all outputs through information networks as free goods rather than commodities to be sold for profit by capitalist firms.

The economist Pat Devine defines social ownership as "ownership by those who are affected by – who have an interest in – the use of the assets involved", distinguishing it from other forms of ownership. Devine argues that this variant of social ownership will be more efficient than the other types of ownership because "it enables the tacit knowledge of all those affected to be drawn upon in the process of negotiating what should be done to further the social interest in any particular context".

The phrases "social production" and "social peer-to-peer" production have been used to classify the type of workplace relationships and ownership structures found in the open-source software movement and Commons-based peer production processes, which operate, value and allocate value without private property and market exchange.

Ownership in Soviet-type economies

In Soviet-type economies, the means of production and natural resources were almost entirely owned by the state and collective enterprises. State enterprises were integrated into a national planning system, where factor inputs were allocated to them by the Ministry for Technical Supply (Gossnab). 

According to The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, "socialist ownership" is a form of social ownership that forms the basis for the socialist system, involving the collective appropriation of material wealth by working people. Social ownership arises out of the course of capitalist development, creating the objective conditions for further socialist transformation and for the emergence of a planned economy with the aim of raising the living standards for everyone in society.

Misuse of the term

Particularly in the United States, the term "socialization" has been mistakenly used to refer to any state or government-operated industry or service (the proper term for such being either nationalization or municipalization). It has also been incorrectly used to mean any tax-funded programs, whether privately run or government run.

Privatization

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Privatization can mean different things including moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when a heavily regulated private company or industry becomes less regulated. Government functions and services may also be privatized; in this case, private entities are tasked with the implementation of government programs or performance of government services that had previously been the purview of state-run agencies. Some examples include revenue collection, law enforcement, and prison management.

Another definition is the purchase of all outstanding shares of a publicly traded company by private investors, or the sale of a state-owned enterprise or municipally owned corporation to private investors. In the case of a for-profit company, the shares are then no longer traded at a stock exchange, as the company became private through private equity; in the case the partial or full sale of a state-owned enterprise or municipally owned corporation to private owners shares may be traded in the public market for the first time, or for the first time since an enterprise's previous nationalization. The second such type of privatization is the demutualization of a mutual organization, cooperative, or public-private partnership in order to form a joint-stock company.

Etymology

The Economist magazine introduced the term "privatization" during the 1930s when it covered Nazi Germany's economic policy. It is not clear if the magazine coincidentally invented the word in English or if the term is a loanword from the same expression in German, where it has been in use since the 19th century.

Definition

The word privatization may mean different things depending on the context in which it is used. It can mean moving something from the public sphere into the private sphere, but it may also be used to describe something that was always private, but heavily regulated, which becomes less regulated through a process of deregulation. The term may also be used descriptively for something that has always been private, but could be public in other jurisdictions.

There are also private entities that may perform public functions. These entities could also be described as privatized. Privatization may mean the government sells state-owned businesses to private interests, but it may also be discussed in the context of the privatization of services or government functions, where private entities are tasked with the implementation of government programs or performance of government services. Gillian E. Metzger has written that: "Private entities [in the US] provide a vast array of social services for the government; administer core aspects of government programs; and perform tasks that appear quintessentially governmental, such as promulgating standards or regulating third-party activities." Metzger mentions an expansion of privatization that includes health and welfare programs, public education, and prisons.

History

Pre-20th century

The history of privatization dates from Ancient Greece, when governments contracted out almost everything to the private sector. In the Roman Republic private individuals and companies performed the majority of services including tax collection (tax farming), army supplies (military contractors), religious sacrifices and construction. However, the Roman Empire also created state-owned enterprises—for example, much of the grain was eventually produced on estates owned by the Emperor. Some scholars suggest that the cost of bureaucracy was one of the reasons for the fall of the Roman Empire.

Perhaps one of the first ideological movements towards privatization came during China's golden age of the Han Dynasty. Taoism came into prominence for the first time at a state level, and it advocated the laissez-faire principle of Wu wei (無為), literally meaning "do nothing". The rulers were counseled by the Taoist clergy that a strong ruler was virtually invisible. 

During the Renaissance, most of Europe was still by and large following the feudal economic model. By contrast, the Ming dynasty in China began once more to practice privatization, especially with regards to their manufacturing industries. This was a reversal of the earlier Song dynasty policies, which had themselves overturned earlier policies in favor of more rigorous state control.

In Britain, the privatization of common lands is referred to as enclosure (in Scotland as the Lowland Clearances and the Highland Clearances). Significant privatizations of this nature occurred from 1760 to 1820, preceding the industrial revolution in that country.

20th century onward

The first mass privatization of state property occurred in Nazi Germany between 1933-37: "It is a fact that the government of the National Socialist Party sold off public ownership in several state-owned firms in the middle of the 1930s. The firms belonged to a wide range of sectors: steel, mining, banking, local public utilities, shipyard, ship-lines, railways, etc. In addition to this, delivery of some public services produced by public administrations prior to the 1930s, especially social services and services related to work, was transferred to the private sector, mainly to several organizations within the Nazi Party."

Great Britain privatized its steel industry in the 1950s, and the West German government embarked on large-scale privatization, including sale of the majority stake in Volkswagen to small investors in public share offerings in 1961. However, it was in the 1980s under Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom and Ronald Reagan in the United States that privatization gained worldwide momentum. Notable privatization attempts in the UK included privatization of Britoil (1982), Amersham International PLC (1982), British Telecom (1984), Sealink ferries (1984), British Petroleum (gradually privatized between 1979 and 1987), British Aerospace (1985 to 1987), British Gas (1986), Rolls-Royce (1987), Rover Group (formerly British Leyland, 1988), British Steel Corporation (1988), and the regional water authorities (mostly in 1989). After 1979, council house tenants in the UK were given the right to buy their homes (at a heavily discounted rate). One million purchased their residences by 1986. 

Such efforts culminated in 1993 when British Rail was privatized under Thatcher's successor, John Major. British Rail had been formed by prior nationalization of private rail companies. The privatization was controversial, and the its impact is still debated today, as doubling of passenger numbers and investment was balanced by an increase in rail subsidy.

Privatization in Latin America flourished in the 1980s and 1990s as a result of a Western liberal economic policy. Companies providing public services such as water management, transportation, and telecommunication were rapidly sold off to the private sector. In the 1990s, privatization revenue from 18 Latin American countries totaled 6% of gross domestic product. Private investment in infrastructure from 1990 and 2001 reached $360.5 billion, $150 billion more than in the next emerging economy.

While economists generally give favorable evaluations of the impact of privatization in Latin America, opinion polls and public protests across the countries suggest that a large segment of the public is dissatisfied with or have negative views of privatization in the region.

In the 1990s, the governments in Eastern and Central Europe engaged in extensive privatization of state-owned enterprises in Eastern and Central Europe and Russia, with assistance from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the German Treuhand, and other governmental and nongovernmental organizations.

Ongoing privatization of Japan Post relates to that of the national postal service and one of the largest banks in the world. After years of debate, the privatization of Japan Post spearheaded by Junichiro Koizumi finally started in 2007. The privatization process is expected to last until 2017. Japan Post was one of the nation's largest employers, as one-third of Japanese state employees worked for it. It was also said to be the largest holder of personal savings in the world. Criticisms against Japan Post were that it served as a channel of corruption and was inefficient. In September 2003, Koizumi's cabinet proposed splitting Japan Post into four separate companies: a bank, an insurance company, a postal service company, and a fourth company to handle the post offices and retail storefronts of the other three.

After the Upper House rejected privatization, Koizumi scheduled nationwide elections for September 11, 2005. He declared the election to be a referendum on postal privatization. Koizumi subsequently won the election, gaining the necessary supermajority and a mandate for reform, and in October 2005, the bill was passed to privatize Japan Post in 2007.

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone's privatization in 1987 involved the largest share offering in financial history at the time. 15 of the world's 20 largest public share offerings have been privatizations of telecoms.

In 1988, the perestroika policy of Mikhail Gorbachev started allowing privatization of the centrally planned economy. Large privatization of the Soviet economy occurred over the next few years as the country dissolved. Other Eastern Bloc countries followed suit after the Revolutions of 1989 introduced non-communist governments. 

The United Kingdom's largest public share offerings were privatizations of British Telecom and British Gas during the 1980s under the Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher, when many state-run firms were sold off to the private sector. The privatization received very mixed views from the public and the parliament. Even former Conservative prime minister Harold Macmillan was critical of the policy, likening it to "selling the family silver". There were around 3 million shareholders in Britain when Thatcher took office in 1979, but the subsequent sale of state-run firms saw the number of shareholders double by 1985. By the time of her resignation in 1990, there were more than 10 million shareholders in Britain.

The largest public shares offering in France involved France Télécom.

Egypt undertook widespread privatization under Hosni Mubarak. He was later overthrown in the 2011 revolution, the public called for re-nationalization as the privatized firms were accused of practicing crony capitalism with the old regime.

Medicare and Medicaid managed care

In the United States, under the Medicare managed care the government pays a managed care organization (MCO) a fixed amount called the "capitated rate" for all medical services received by a beneficiary in a given period. Enrollment in the programs has increased substantially since 1990; in 2002 60% of Medicaid beneficiaries and 12% of Medicare beneficiaries were being treated by MCOs. Private sector involvement in Medicare and Medicaid is not limited to MCOs; private doctors, hospitals, nursing homes provide medical care; reimbursement claims are processed by private intermediaries; and peer review organizations, utilization review committees and accreditation organizations like JCAHO are staffed by private medical personnel.

Welfare privatization

Homeless shelters and food banks are run by private organizations, who also provide treatment services, operate Head Start programs and work with child welfare agencies. Privatization of welfare system expanded in 1996, when the Aid to Families with Dependent Child (AFDC) program was replaced with the Temporary Aid to Needy Families (TANF) program. Welfare services that are often privatized include workforce development, job training and job placement are often privatized.

Public education

There is also some private sector involvement in the public education system including charter schools, Educational Management Organizations (EMOs), and school voucher programs. EMOs are usually for-profit and manage charter schools and sometimes traditional public schools as well. The United States Supreme Court upheld school voucher programs against an Establishment Clause challenge in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.

Private prisons

In the US in 2001, private prison facilities housed 12.3% of all federal prisoners and 5.8% of state prisoners. Contracts for these private prisons regulate prison conditions and operation, but the nature of running a prison requires a substantial exercise of discretion. Private prisons are more exposed to liability than state run prisons.

Foreign affairs

Both for-profit and non-profit entities are tasked with various responsibilities related to the US foreign aid budget such as providing emergency humanitarian relief, development assistance, as well as post-conflict reconstruction efforts. Similarly, private entities have started to perform tasks that have traditionally been regarded as falling within the government's diplomatic and military authority like participating in peace negotiations, military training, intelligence gathering and other security services or combat-related missions. Many of the military interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison were provided by a private contractor and lacked formal military training; this was subsequently identified as a contributing factor to detainee abuse at the prison by the Fay report.

The United Nations uses private subcontractors as well, and in some cases, "failed states" have relied on private entities extensively for a range of tasks including building critical infrastructure, managing social services programs and using private military companies during the course of armed conflicts.

US Constitution

The United States Constitution only constrains state action and, with few exceptions, "erects no shield against merely private conduct, however discriminatory or wrongful". Gillian Metzger writes:

Adequately guarding against abuse of public power requires application of constitutional principles to every exercise of state authority, regardless of the formal public or private status of the actor involved: 'It surely cannot be that government, state or federal, is able to evade the most solemn obligations imposed in the Constitution by simply resorting to the corporate form' and thereby transferring operation of government programs to private hands...

Even if private actors can't be held accountable through the traditional constitutional mechanism, they may be bound by other regulatory or contractual requirements. Tort law might be another avenue of protection, and some may argue that this protection could be even more effective as public agencies and employees usually enjoy some degree of immunity from civil liability.

Forms of privatization

There are five main methods of privatization:

1. Share issue privatization: Shares sale on the stock market.
2. Asset sale privatization: Asset divestiture to a strategic investor, usually by auction or through the Treuhand model.
3. Voucher privatization: Distribution of vouchers, which represent part ownership of a corporation, to all citizens, usually for free or at a very low price.
4. Privatization from below: Start of new private businesses in formerly socialist countries.
5. Management buyout or employee buyout: Distribution of shares for free or at a very low price to workers or management of the organization.

The choice of sale method is influenced by the capital market and the political and firm-specific factors. Privatization through the stock market is more likely to be the method used when there is an established capital market capable of absorbing the shares. A market with high liquidity can facilitate the privatization. If the capital markets are insufficiently developed, however, it would be difficult to find enough buyers. The shares may have to be under priced, and the sales may not raise as much capital as would be justified by the fair value of the company being privatized. Many governments, therefore, elect for listings in more sophisticated markets, for example, Euronext, and the London, New York and Hong Kong stock exchanges. 

Governments in developing countries and transition countries more often resort to direct asset sales to a few investors, partly because those countries do not yet have a stock market with high capital.

Voucher privatization occurred mainly in the transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe, such as Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia. Additionally, privatization from below had made important contribution to economic growth in transition economies.

In one study assimilating some of the literature on "privatization" that occurred in Russian and Czech Republic transition economies, the authors identified three methods of privatization: "privatization by sale", "mass privatization", and "mixed privatization". Their calculations showed that "mass privatization" was the most effective method.

However, in economies "characterized by shortages" and maintained by the state bureaucracy, wealth was accumulated and concentrated by "gray/black market" operators. Privatizing industries by sale to these individuals did not mean a transition to "effective private sector owners [of former] state assets". Rather than mainly participating in a market economy, these individuals could prefer elevating their personal status or prefer accumulating political power. Instead, outside foreign investment led to the efficient conduct of former state assets in the private sector and market economy.

Through privatization by direct asset sale or the stock market, bidders compete to offer higher prices, generating more revenue for the state. Voucher privatization, on the other hand, could represent a genuine transfer of assets to the general population, creating a sense of participation and inclusion. A market could be created if the government permits transfer of vouchers among voucher holders.

Secured borrowing

Some privatization transactions can be interpreted as a form of a secured loan and are criticized as a "particularly noxious form of governmental debt". In this interpretation, the upfront payment from the privatization sale corresponds to the principal amount of the loan, while the proceeds from the underlying asset correspond to secured interest payments – the transaction can be considered substantively the same as a secured loan, though it is structured as a sale. This interpretation is particularly argued to apply to recent municipal transactions in the United States, particularly for fixed term, such as the 2008 sale of the proceeds from Chicago parking meters for 75 years. It is argued that this is motivated by "politicians' desires to borrow money surreptitiously", due to legal restrictions on and political resistance to alternative sources of revenue, viz, raising taxes or issuing debt.

Results

Literature reviews find that in competitive industries with well-informed consumers, privatization consistently improves efficiency. The more competitive the industry, the greater the improvement in output, profitability, and efficiency. Such efficiency gains mean a one-off increase in GDP, but through improved incentives to innovate and reduce costs also tend to raise the rate of economic growth. Although typically there are many costs associated with these efficiency gains, many economists argue that these can be dealt with by appropriate government support through redistribution and perhaps retraining. Yet, some empirical literature suggests that privatization could also have very modest effects on efficiency and quite regressive distributive impact. In the first attempt at a social welfare analysis of the British privatization program under the Conservative governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major during the 1980s and 1990s, Massimo Florio points to the absence of any productivity shock resulting strictly from ownership change. Instead, the impact on the previously nationalized companies of the UK productivity leap under the Conservatives varied in different industries. In some cases, it occurred prior to privatization, and in other cases, it occurred upon privatization or several years afterward.

A study by the European Commission found that the UK rail network (which was privatized from 1994–97) was most improved out of all the 27 EU nations from 1997–2012. The report examined a range of 14 different factors and the UK came top in four of the factors, second and third in another two and fourth in three, coming top overall.

Privatizations in Russia and Latin America were accompanied by large-scale corruption during the sale of the state-owned companies. Those with political connections unfairly gained large wealth, which has discredited privatization in these regions. While media have widely reported the grand corruption that accompanied those sales, studies have argued that in addition to increased operating efficiency, daily petty corruption is, or would be, larger without privatization, and that corruption is more prevalent in non-privatized sectors. Furthermore, there is evidence to suggest that extralegal and unofficial activities are more prevalent in countries that privatized less.

A 2009 study published in The Lancet medical journal initially claimed to have found that as many as a million working men died as a result of economic shocks associated with mass privatization in the former Soviet Union and in Eastern Europe during the 1990s, although a further study revealed that there were errors in their method and "correlations reported in the original article are simply not robust." Historian Walter Scheidel, a specialist in ancient history, posits that economic inequality and wealth concentration in the top percentile "had been made possible by the transfer of state assets to private owners."

In Latin America, there is a discrepancy between the economic efficiency of privatization and the political/social ramifications that occur. On the one hand, economic indicators, including firm profitability, productivity, and growth, project positive microeconomic results. On the other hand, however, these results have largely been met with a negative criticism and citizen coalitions. This neoliberal criticism highlights the ongoing conflict between varying visions of economic development. Karl Polanyi emphasizes the societal concerns of self-regulating markets through a concept known as a "double movement". In essence, whenever societies move towards increasingly unrestrained, free-market rule, a natural and inevitable societal correction emerges to undermine the contradictions of capitalism. This was the case in the 2000 Cochabamba protests. 

Privatization in Latin America has invariably experienced increasing push-back from the public. Some suggest that implementing a less efficient but more politically mindful approach could be more sustainable.

In India, a survey by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) —Utilization of Free Medical Services by Children Belonging to the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) in Private Hospitals in New Delhi, 2011-12: A Rapid Appraisal—indicates under-utilization of the free beds available for EWS category in private hospitals in Delhi, though they were allotted land at subsidized rates.

In Australia a "People's Inquiry into Privatisation" (2016/17) found that the impact of privatisation on communities was negative. The report from the inquiry "Taking Back Control" made a range of recommendations to provide accountability and transparency in the process. The report highlighted privatization in healthcare, aged care, child care, social services, government departments, electricity, prisons and vocational education featuring the voices of workers, community members and academics.

Opinion

Support

Studies show that private market factors can more efficiently deliver many goods or service than governments due to free market competition. Over time this tends to lead to lower prices, improved quality, more choices, less corruption, less red tape, and/or quicker delivery. Many proponents do not argue that everything should be privatized. According to them, market failures and natural monopolies could be problematic. However, anarcho-capitalists prefer that every function of the state be privatized, including defense and dispute resolution.

Proponents of privatization make the following arguments:

• Performance. State-run industries tend to be bureaucratic. A political government may only be motivated to improve a function when its poor performance becomes politically sensitive.
• Increased efficiency. Private companies and firms have a greater incentive to produce goods and services more efficiently to increase profits.
• Specialization. A private business has the ability to focus all relevant human and financial resources onto specific functions. A state-owned firm does not have the necessary resources to specialize its goods and services as a result of the general products provided to the greatest number of people in the population.
• Improvements. Conversely, the government may put off improvements due to political sensitivity and special interests—even in cases of companies that are run well and better serve their customers' needs.
• Corruption. A state-monopolized function is prone to corruption; decisions are made primarily for political reasons, personal gain of the decision-maker (i.e. "graft"), rather than economic ones. Corruption (or principal–agent issues) in a state-run corporation affects the ongoing asset stream and company performance, whereas any corruption that may occur during the privatization process is a one-time event and does not affect ongoing cash flow or performance of the company.
• Accountability. Managers of privately owned companies are accountable to their owners/shareholders and to the consumer, and can only exist and thrive where needs are met. Managers of publicly owned companies are required to be more accountable to the broader community and to political "stakeholders". This can reduce their ability to directly and specifically serve the needs of their customers, and can bias investment decisions away from otherwise profitable areas.
• Civil-liberty concerns. A company controlled by the state may have access to information or assets which may be used against dissidents or any individuals who disagree with their policies.
• Goals. A political government tends to run an industry or company for political goals rather than economic ones.
• Capital. Privately held companies can sometimes more easily raise investment capital in the financial markets when such local markets exist and are suitably liquid. While interest rates for private companies are often higher than for government debt, this can serve as a useful constraint to promote efficient investments by private companies, instead of cross-subsidizing them with the overall credit-risk of the country. Investment decisions are then governed by market interest rates. State-owned industries have to compete with demands from other government departments and special interests. In either case, for smaller markets, political risk may add substantially to the cost of capital.
• Security. Governments have had the tendency to "bail out" poorly run businesses, often due to the sensitivity of job losses, when economically, it may be better to let the business fold.
• Lack of market discipline. Poorly managed state companies are insulated from the same discipline as private companies, which could go bankrupt, have their management removed, or be taken over by competitors. Private companies are also able to take greater risks and then seek bankruptcy protection against creditors if those risks turn sour.
• Natural monopolies. The existence of natural monopolies does not mean that these sectors must be state owned. Governments can enact or are armed with anti-trust legislation and bodies to deal with anti-competitive behavior of all companies public or private.
• Concentration of wealth. Ownership of and profits from successful enterprises tend to be dispersed and diversified -particularly in voucher privatization. The availability of more investment vehicles stimulates capital markets and promotes liquidity and job creation.
• Political influence. Nationalized industries are prone to interference from politicians for political or populist reasons. Examples include making an industry buy supplies from local producers (when that may be more expensive than buying from abroad), forcing an industry to freeze its prices/fares to satisfy the electorate or control inflation, increasing its staffing to reduce unemployment, or moving its operations to marginal constituencies.
• Profits. Corporations exist to generate profits for their shareholders. Private companies make a profit by enticing consumers to buy their products in preference to their competitors' (or by increasing primary demand for their products, or by reducing costs). Private corporations typically profit more if they serve the needs of their clients well. Corporations of different sizes may target different market niches in order to focus on marginal groups and satisfy their demand. A company with good corporate governance will therefore be incentivized to meet the needs of its customers efficiently.
• Job gains. As the economy becomes more efficient, more profits are obtained and no government subsidies and less taxes are needed, there will be more private money available for investments and consumption and more profitable and better-paid jobs will be created than in the case of a more regulated economy.

Opposition

Opponents of certain privatizations believe that certain public goods and services should remain primarily in the hands of government in order to ensure that everyone in society has access to them (such as law enforcement, basic health care, and basic education). There is a positive externality when the government provides society at large with public goods and services such as defense and disease control. Some national constitutions in effect define their governments' "core businesses" as being the provision of such things as justice, tranquility, defense, and general welfare. These governments' direct provision of security, stability, and safety, is intended to be done for the common good (in the public interest) with a long-term (for posterity) perspective. As for natural monopolies, opponents of privatization claim that they aren't subject to fair competition, and better administrated by the state. 

Although private companies will provide a similar good or service alongside the government, opponents of privatization are careful about completely transferring the provision of public goods, services and assets into private hands for the following reasons:

• Performance. A democratically elected government is accountable to the people through a legislature, Congress or Parliament, and is motivated to safeguarding the assets of the nation. The profit motive may be subordinated to social objectives.
• Improvements. the government is motivated to performance improvements as well run businesses contribute to the State's revenues.
• Corruption. Government ministers and civil servants are bound to uphold the highest ethical standards, and standards of probity are guaranteed through codes of conduct and declarations of interest. However, the selling process could lack transparency, allowing the purchaser and civil servants controlling the sale to gain personally.
• Accountability. The public has less control and oversight of private companies.
• Civil-liberty concerns. A democratically elected government is accountable to the people through a parliament, and can intervene when civil liberties are threatened.
• Goals. The government may seek to use state companies as instruments to further social goals for the benefit of the nation as a whole.
• Capital. Governments can raise money in the financial markets most cheaply to re-lend to state-owned enterprises.
• Cuts in essential services. If a government-owned company providing an essential service (such as the water supply) to all citizens is privatized, its new owner(s) could lead to the abandoning of the social obligation to those who are less able to pay, or to regions where this service is unprofitable.
• Natural monopolies. Privatization will not result in true competition if a natural monopoly exists.
• Concentration of wealth. Profits from successful enterprises end up in private, often foreign, hands instead of being available for the common good.
• Political influence. Governments may more easily exert pressure on state-owned firms to help implementing government policy.
• Profit. Private companies do not have any goal other than to maximize profits. A private company will serve the needs of those who are most willing (and able) to pay, as opposed to the needs of the majority, and are thus anti-democratic. The more necessary a good is, the lower the price elasticity of demand, as people will attempt to buy it no matter the price. In the case of a price elasticity of demand of zero (perfectly inelastic good), the demand part of supply and demand theories does not work.
• Privatization and poverty. It is acknowledged by many studies that there are winners and losers with privatization. The number of losers—which may add up to the size and severity of poverty—can be unexpectedly large if the method and process of privatization and how it is implemented are seriously flawed (e.g. lack of transparency leading to state-owned assets being appropriated at minuscule amounts by those with political connections, absence of regulatory institutions leading to transfer of monopoly rents from public to private sector, improper design and inadequate control of the privatization process leading to asset stripping).
• Job loss. Due to the additional financial burden placed on privatized companies to succeed without any government help, unlike the public companies, jobs could be lost to keep more money in the company.
• Reduced wages and benefits. A 2014 report by In the Public Interest, a resource center on privatization, argues that "outsourcing public services sets off a downward spiral in which reduced worker wages and benefits can hurt the local economy and overall stability of middle and working class communities."
• Inferior quality products. Private, for-profit companies might cut corners on providing quality goods and services in order to maximize profit.

Economic theory

In economic theory, privatization has been studied in the field of contract theory. When contracts are complete, institutions such as (private or public) property are difficult to explain, since every desired incentive structure can be achieved with sufficiently complex contractual arrangements, regardless of the institutional structure (all that matters is who are the decision makers and what is their available information). In contrast, when contracts are incomplete, institutions matter. A leading application of the incomplete contract paradigm in the context of privatization is the model by Hart, Shleifer, and Vishny (1997). In their model, a manager can make investments to increase quality (but they may also increase costs) and investments to decrease costs (but they may also reduce quality). It turns out that it depends on the particular situation whether private ownership or public ownership is desirable. The Hart-Shleifer-Vishny model has been further developed in various directions, e.g. to allow for mixed public-private ownership and endogenous assignments of the investment tasks.