Malanga at City Journal on "The New Privatization." Apparently infrastructure has market value, so it makes sense to wonder why governments should be running these things. A quote:
Daley seeks federal approval to auction the rights to operate Midway, Chicago’s second-largest airport, as part of a federal project to demonstrate the benefits of privatization. Midway would be the second airport, and the first major hub, to enter the program. (The first was Stewart International Airport in Newburgh, New York, which the Pataki administration privatized in 2000.) In Colorado, the independent state authority that operates the Northwest Parkway, a Denver-area toll road, is evaluating bids for a 50-year lease to run it; the transaction could raise $500 million. New Jersey governor Jon Corzine is thinking of selling the New Jersey Turnpike, which could yield some $20 billion, though he’s also considering floating municipal bonds, backed by the turnpike’s tolls, which would raise less money but allow the state to continue operating it. Many smaller-scale deals are in the works, too. The Macquarie director said last fall that he anticipated as many as 25 toll-road privatizations in the U.S. over the next two years, potentially pouring $80 billion into government coffers.
Selling existing assets may turn out to be only a small part of this promising story. With far more money to deploy than there are public assets to sell, investors are now vying to help governments build and operate new infrastructure, and budget-squeezed states are taking them up on their offers.
Read the whole thing. Yes, that is the Brooklyn Bridge.
