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In reality, governments enjoy low accountability compared to private companies that must compete for business. That is why failed government programs hardly ev

In reality, governments enjoy low accountability compared to private companies that must compete for business. That is why failed government programs hardly ever get replaced.

pavel_lishin 11y ago
I'm less afraid of unreplaced-failed-government-programs, and more afraid of unreplaced-successful-privacy-invading-companies, especially when they have government approval.
vtlynch 11y ago
Private companies may be held more accountable, but they are done so by a much smaller group of people. I think its also fairly evident that when a private company harms the general public, the only thing keeping them accountable is the government.
gress 11y ago
Private companies usually do everything they can to defeat competition - not to engage in it.
- jazzyk 11y ago
  s/defeat/remove
wfo 11y ago
In reality, private companies enjoy low accountability compared to government because while they perpetuate the myth of a highly competitive market, it isn't so; they are generally inefficient small fiefdoms. And government isn't allowed to keep secrets the way private companies are; and is required by regulation to act in a certain fair and reasonable way. If someone asks you for every email you've sent in the last year and you're a CEO, you give them the finger and laugh. If you work at a government agency, buy a couple thousand reams of paper and start printing.
- Kalium 11y ago
  Are you familiar with the many abuseable exemptions in FOIA?
  - wfo 11y ago
    Once private companies have a FOIA of their own that applies to their internal communication I'd be happy to examine the exemptions in the two statutes and how they compare. But for now it's so disgustingly false to claim that companies are less accountable than government that it's hard to believe such a claim is not intentionally dishonest.
    - Kalium 11y ago
      First, that's not any claim of mine, so please be nice. Second, my point was that FOIA doesn't bring as much transparency as you might hope. Third, the question of accountability is two-fold: to whom and to what extent? Governments and companies are accountable to different groups and to different degrees. But just as the government of Brunei is not accountable to a randomly selected American, a company of which you are neither customer nor shareholder is not accountable to you. Given that companies rely more on consent that governments, the degree of accountability to shareholders is perhaps greater. Thus I submit that measuring accountability purely in degrees is... incomplete.
      - toomuchtodo 11y ago
        Florida's Sunshine Laws [1] do provide a very high amount of transparency, and are a model that should be replicated across the US. [1] http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B7418525791B006A54E4 http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B741852...
      - wfo 11y ago
        It wasn't directed at you, I'm sorry if it came out that way: my claim about transparency was a relative one and not an absolute one and in fact I agree with your perspective that transparency even in government isn't as good as it could be in an absolute sense (in some cases, of course); it just doesn't have any bearing the point I was responding to, which is a direct comparison between public sector and private sector. And very few top-level employees of very large publicly held companies consider themselves accountable to a very tiny elite group of wealthy shareholders. I don't think that this is what people mean when they use the word 'accountable' though. If you want to stretch the use of the word that far, you could say everyone is equally accountable because they are accountable to themselves, or religious people are more accountable because they consider themselves accountable to God while Atheists don't. I think it's fair to assume when someone uses the word 'accountability' in this context they mean to society as a whole. I would also reject the notion that companies rely on consent more so than governments; they are dictatorships run top-down by generally a single manager who commands his underlings. Companies and governments are enormous bureaucratic organizations which have enormous impact on the societies in which they operate and the people that live in them. Government has checks and balances and voting and are required to publish information about their operations and are open to being changed by the general public (through voting). Companies are secret private dictatorships which do as they please without regard for the wishes or needs or desires of the general public (only when those wishes happen to coincide with a profit motive; a rare happy accident) and publish nothing about their operations by design. I think it's quite fair to make the claim about relative transparency/accountability, that governments beat companies always; governments are required to try, companies do not even pretend to try (in fact the most profitable companies actively refuse to try). I think you have a very good point about how transparent this minimal transparency is in government, but the fact that it even exists means governments beat companies hands down every time.
satanrepents 11y ago
Uber has competition?

In reality, governments enjoy low accountability compared to private companies that must compete for business. That is why failed government programs hardly ever get replaced.

pavel_lishin 11y ago

I'm less afraid of unreplaced-failed-government-programs, and more afraid of unreplaced-successful-privacy-invading-companies, especially when they have government approval.

vtlynch 11y ago

Private companies may be held more accountable, but they are done so by a much smaller group of people. I think its also fairly evident that when a private company harms the general public, the only thing keeping them accountable is the government.

gress 11y ago

Private companies usually do everything they can to defeat competition - not to engage in it.

jazzyk 11y ago
s/defeat/remove

wfo 11y ago

In reality, private companies enjoy low accountability compared to government because while they perpetuate the myth of a highly competitive market, it isn't so; they are generally inefficient small fiefdoms. And government isn't allowed to keep secrets the way private companies are; and is required by regulation to act in a certain fair and reasonable way. If someone asks you for every email you've sent in the last year and you're a CEO, you give them the finger and laugh. If you work at a government agency, buy a couple thousand reams of paper and start printing.

Kalium 11y ago
Are you familiar with the many abuseable exemptions in FOIA?
- wfo 11y ago
  Once private companies have a FOIA of their own that applies to their internal communication I'd be happy to examine the exemptions in the two statutes and how they compare. But for now it's so disgustingly false to claim that companies are less accountable than government that it's hard to believe such a claim is not intentionally dishonest.
  - Kalium 11y ago
    First, that's not any claim of mine, so please be nice. Second, my point was that FOIA doesn't bring as much transparency as you might hope. Third, the question of accountability is two-fold: to whom and to what extent? Governments and companies are accountable to different groups and to different degrees. But just as the government of Brunei is not accountable to a randomly selected American, a company of which you are neither customer nor shareholder is not accountable to you. Given that companies rely more on consent that governments, the degree of accountability to shareholders is perhaps greater. Thus I submit that measuring accountability purely in degrees is... incomplete.
    - toomuchtodo 11y ago
      Florida's Sunshine Laws [1] do provide a very high amount of transparency, and are a model that should be replicated across the US. [1] http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B7418525791B006A54E4 http://myfloridalegal.com/pages.nsf/Main/DC0B20B7DC22B741852...
    - wfo 11y ago
      It wasn't directed at you, I'm sorry if it came out that way: my claim about transparency was a relative one and not an absolute one and in fact I agree with your perspective that transparency even in government isn't as good as it could be in an absolute sense (in some cases, of course); it just doesn't have any bearing the point I was responding to, which is a direct comparison between public sector and private sector. And very few top-level employees of very large publicly held companies consider themselves accountable to a very tiny elite group of wealthy shareholders. I don't think that this is what people mean when they use the word 'accountable' though. If you want to stretch the use of the word that far, you could say everyone is equally accountable because they are accountable to themselves, or religious people are more accountable because they consider themselves accountable to God while Atheists don't. I think it's fair to assume when someone uses the word 'accountability' in this context they mean to society as a whole. I would also reject the notion that companies rely on consent more so than governments; they are dictatorships run top-down by generally a single manager who commands his underlings. Companies and governments are enormous bureaucratic organizations which have enormous impact on the societies in which they operate and the people that live in them. Government has checks and balances and voting and are required to publish information about their operations and are open to being changed by the general public (through voting). Companies are secret private dictatorships which do as they please without regard for the wishes or needs or desires of the general public (only when those wishes happen to coincide with a profit motive; a rare happy accident) and publish nothing about their operations by design. I think it's quite fair to make the claim about relative transparency/accountability, that governments beat companies always; governments are required to try, companies do not even pretend to try (in fact the most profitable companies actively refuse to try). I think you have a very good point about how transparent this minimal transparency is in government, but the fact that it even exists means governments beat companies hands down every time.

satanrepents 11y ago

Uber has competition?