If it's privately ran it needs to be profitable otherwise it will no longer be ran (at some point). Of course the privately ran business could change course at

If it's privately ran it needs to be profitable otherwise it will no longer be ran (at some point). Of course the privately ran business could change course at some time and become profitable (i.e. raise prices or discontinue unprofitable business lines / areas of service). But if that's the only X store left in town and they discontinue service, you're kinda screwed. The same ends up being true for publicly ran things as well. Flint is a great example of a town that was not profitable and so Michigan stepped in and changed their water supply to decrease the towns cost (a scenario that would've been avoided if Flint wasn't broke, amongst other ways it could've been avoided). It's just that at the government level you can have many services that cost more than they take in (often because you just don't charge people for the service; which is fine) which get balanced out (eventually) by other "services" (often more general taxes) that take in more money than they cost. If you live in a town and continuously it spends $X a year and takes in $<X a year, that difference is going to eventually cause a problem. Perhaps it means that roads will stop being repaired. Perhaps it means you'll have boil water notices all the time.