Monday, June 12, 2006
Invention and Allocating Scarce Resources
Today's Mises Daily Article is about the history of the Internet and its invention by public funds and its growth in private markets.
Peter Klein does a good job of talking about the 'unseen' involved in a formal analysis of this topic. What would the internet be like, if it was not developed by the government and produced as a congestible public good? He claims that they would have developed varying pricing mechanisms for different transmissions.
Although I agree with his conclusion from an ideological standpoint, he is not very convincing. It is still a good read -- it just has an abrupt and unsupported ending.
(P.S. he also notes Margolis and Leibowitz's work)
Peter Klein does a good job of talking about the 'unseen' involved in a formal analysis of this topic. What would the internet be like, if it was not developed by the government and produced as a congestible public good? He claims that they would have developed varying pricing mechanisms for different transmissions.
Although I agree with his conclusion from an ideological standpoint, he is not very convincing. It is still a good read -- it just has an abrupt and unsupported ending.
(P.S. he also notes Margolis and Leibowitz's work)
