NO COMPETITION

I've written before in this space about the lack of competition in many government functions, and how it skews things like efficiency and motivation.  In other words, if I'm a barber and I decided to stop doing a good job or jack up my prices, my customers would stop coming to me and go down the street to another barber.  But if I was the only barber in town, my customers would be stuck with me even if I decided to stop doing a good job or jack up my prices.

 

So here is one of the big differences between the private sector and the public sector.  Our free-market system is efficient, ruthlessly so at times, when it comes to weeding out products, services, and companies that don't keep up in their value to their customers.  If you want to stay in business tomorrow, you have to stay ahead of your competitors today.  Governments, on the other hand, don't often face the same kind of competition, especially when it comes to three pretty important buckets of products and services. 

 

First, the poorer you are, the less able you are to move if you don't like the local government.  Richer folks are more mobile and so governments do in fact face competition when it comes to providing them with a basket of goods (clean streets, good schools) in exchange for a price (taxes).  But localities have a monopoly over poorer folks, which can lead to the "bad barber" kinds of behavior by those localities.

 

Second, there is no competition when it comes to the federal government and its policies, products, and services.  Even for the rich, who can move from Philly to the suburbs or from southeastern Pennsylvania to South Jersey, there is no escaping the rule of the federal government.  (I suppose you could move to Canada if you don't like it.) 

 

Finally, when it comes to acute situations, it's often the government or no one. In situations of natural disasters and terrorist attacks, as well as smaller-scale ones like water main breaks and house fires, there's no one to turn to but a public agency.  

 

Not to say there is no incentive, of course.  Government people that do poor jobs can and do get voted out of office, fired from their jobs, and/or vilified in the media.  Government that do good jobs can and do get voted into higher office, promoted to better jobs, and/or lauded in the media.  These are certainly sufficient positive and negative motivators.  It's just different than the private sector, where it's easier to measure success, easier to know how you're doing.

 

But let's flip this around.  Be good in the private sector, and you can take pride that you're better than your competitor and/or that you generated more profits than last year.  Be good in the public sector, and you can take pride in a whole lot more.  You can be proud that you did the best you could for the poor and disenfranchised, those who needed it the most and who had the least number of choices to turn to.  You can be proud that you provided a valuable benefit to an entire nation of citizens.  You can be proud that you answered the call in the situations of the greatest urgency and emergency, when people were in distress and they had nowhere else to turn.

 

In other words, you can look at public sector work as inferior to private sector work because it lacks the profit incentive, has harder challenges, and less tangible measures and rewards for success.  Or you can look at it as superior to private sector work, not in spite of those facts but because of them. 

 

(Postscript: what has been interesting to note as I think back on the articles, magazines, and books I've gravitated toward in the last ten years or so is how these differences are really beginning to blur.  That is to say, the private sector is beginning the understand the importance of non-financial considerations, complicating the picture for some – for it is truly harder to pursue financial gain AND environmental stewardship AND social justice – and crystallizing it for others.  Meanwhile, the public sector is making impressive advances in philosophies normally reserved for the for-profit world, like performance measurement and outsourcing.  I guess I've always found the blurry parts more interesting.)