Privatization Ain't Panacea

According to the Charlottesville (VA) Daily Progress, government privatizations schemes are increasingly met with disfavor:

Michael Likosky of New York University, an expert on privatization who has studied it across the country and overseas, believes taxpayers and policymakers are becoming wary of outsourcing. He said they generally consider privatization—Likosky calls it “government by contract”—effective in managing public assets, such as harbors and highways, but are leery of its usefulness in supplying services.

That apparently is grounded in widely reported delays, disruptions and disappointments in privatized services, such as Virginia’s troubled experience with a Northrop Grumman-run information-technology network under a 10-year, $2.3 billion contract.