Barely had I published my last entry, when the Washington Post came out with a story about how many Democrats are adding fiscal austerity pledges to their campaign platform. I'm unimpressed.
On one hand, it's good that politicians of both parties have finally come to understand that Americans are fed up with deficits and debt. On the other, Democrats in general and many Republicans are missing the bigger picture: the American people want a reevaluation of the proper role of government and how that role should be distributed among the levels of government.
It's not just about the money; it's about being accountability. And if private enterprise cannot successfully undertake some collective action and government can do better, it should be the most local government that can address it, which also happens to be the level most accountable to the people. Suggesting that a congressman from Ohio can be held accountable for education quality in Florida, or a senator from New York for road congestion in California, is simply preposterous.
It's also about being left alone. The decennial census is supposed to count inhabitants for the purpose of apportioning members of the House of Representatives, nothing more. Yet it has morphed into a vast treasure trove for social science researchers. It sounds benign, but besides the privacy issues, the conclusions of that research provide justification for any number of wasteful and often counterproductive interventions.
Americans want more than cheap talk about the federal budget. They want their national political representatives to fundamentally reconsider the role of the federal government, eliminating, privatizing, or transferring to the states those activities that are not within its proper scope.
Showing posts with label privatization. Show all posts
Showing posts with label privatization. Show all posts
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Ending the Western Water Game
Last week, Senator McCain upset a lot of people in Colorado when he mused about renegotiating an agreement that allocates water usage from the Colorado River to various interests in the West.
The intesity of feeling about water is strange to those of us from the eastern portion of the United States, where water is so abundant that a staggering number of dams are used simply to prevent downstream flooding. Pittsburgh, for example, receives 3.1 inches of precipitation per month on average with a July high average of 3.8 inches and a February low of 2.4 inches. Denver averages 1.3 inches and ranges from 0.5 to 2.4 inches. Other Colorado River users include Las Vegas (.37, 0.1-0.5) and Yuma (.28, 0.0-0.6). Water is scarce in the West, and scarcity breeds conflict, as Mr. McCain recently discovered.
As long as water resources are allocated by political methods, their allocation will be insecure and subject to intense feelings. But this compact was finalized in 1922, and water needs have clearly changed since my grandmother was born. Water is too expensive in some places and too cheap in others.
An ideal solution would not only allow water to flow (physically and metaphorically) to its highest-valued use, but it would also draw the political venom out of the issue. The answer seems obvious: convert historical water allocations into water rights that can be bought and sold in normal markets. The rights must granted to individuals and businesses, and state governments must be prohibited from owning them.
This system would not force anyone to give up their water, but if they decide they're better off selling or leasing all or part of their right, they would be free to do so. Nothing would prevent conservation groups from purchasing the quantities of water to ensure ecosystem preservation goals.
Waste and inefficiency would be greatly reduced, users would have true choices, and the issue would be much less contentious. Propose that, Senator McCain!
The 86-year-old water compact says that Arizona, Nevada and California can take 7.5 million acre feet of water from the river annually. The rest is split among Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Wyoming. The four up-river states worry that the more populous southerly trio would use a renegotiation to quench its ever-increasing thirst at their expense.
The intesity of feeling about water is strange to those of us from the eastern portion of the United States, where water is so abundant that a staggering number of dams are used simply to prevent downstream flooding. Pittsburgh, for example, receives 3.1 inches of precipitation per month on average with a July high average of 3.8 inches and a February low of 2.4 inches. Denver averages 1.3 inches and ranges from 0.5 to 2.4 inches. Other Colorado River users include Las Vegas (.37, 0.1-0.5) and Yuma (.28, 0.0-0.6). Water is scarce in the West, and scarcity breeds conflict, as Mr. McCain recently discovered.
As long as water resources are allocated by political methods, their allocation will be insecure and subject to intense feelings. But this compact was finalized in 1922, and water needs have clearly changed since my grandmother was born. Water is too expensive in some places and too cheap in others.
An ideal solution would not only allow water to flow (physically and metaphorically) to its highest-valued use, but it would also draw the political venom out of the issue. The answer seems obvious: convert historical water allocations into water rights that can be bought and sold in normal markets. The rights must granted to individuals and businesses, and state governments must be prohibited from owning them.
This system would not force anyone to give up their water, but if they decide they're better off selling or leasing all or part of their right, they would be free to do so. Nothing would prevent conservation groups from purchasing the quantities of water to ensure ecosystem preservation goals.
Waste and inefficiency would be greatly reduced, users would have true choices, and the issue would be much less contentious. Propose that, Senator McCain!
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