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From "Why Texas Republicans are Souring on Crypto" from The Economist https://archive.ph/eIXGc
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this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2024
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Texas is the champ at letting private industry profit from government.
They built a toll road with $1Billion in public money, using a private equity firm to build it which resulted in large profits, and hazardous work conditions. Then they sold 50 years of toll rights to a different private equity firm for $600mil, with no limit to how much could be charged. When tolls predictably skyrocketed, they had to buy those rights back for $1.7 billion after the firm had collected tolls for 5 years.
Jesus, sounds like Texas is corrupt af.
I think it was the regular political corruption that exists everywhere in the US, lobbying, campaign donations and the revolving door. Texas is definitely winning the race to sell off all the public goods, but this kind of thing happens all over. Chicago sold off the rights to the parking spaces on public streets in a similar kind of deal.
Was it Chicago or Detroit that sold the rights to their parking meters for 75 years to a group of investors from Abu Dhabi, and after like 4 years they had already made back their money and just started jacking up the price of parking because they could. Also supposedly there is a clause in the agreement that makes it so the city has to pay excessively anytime they want to take away a parking space that the investors own. It's literally insane that a city that size doesn't just tell the investors to fuck off and sic the national guard on them.
That was Chicago.
I think we'll see more of this stuff. It's just too tempting for politicians. They can fill a budget hole, lower property taxes, etc, and make it some future administrations problem. Especially if they structure it with a gradual increase in prices.
It's like taxing people 50 years in the future but getting to spend the money now.