OPINION: Government ownership: Some modest proposals

In the March 1 Sunday Journal, former state Sen. Bill Tallman wrote a piece (“The high cost of Blackstone’s power play”) opposing Blackstone’s acquisition of TXNM Energy, the parent company of Public Service Company of New Mexico. He made the points that Blackstone is only interested in profits and that private-sector companies should not own utilities. I couldn’t agree more. The generation and distribution of electricity is far too important to be left in private hands. But I think Tallman hardly goes far enough. There are so many other facets of our lives that would be improved by public ownership.

Take automobiles. Here in New Mexico we depend on them daily. But they are expensive, dangerous and spew out all sorts of pollution. So why do we stand for the manufacture of automobiles by the private sector? And the problem goes well beyond Ford and General Motors. So many of our cars and pickups are manufactured by overseas companies, to say nothing of the foreign parts in domestically manufactured ones. How can we feel secure when agents answerable to foreign conglomerates sleep in our garages?

Then there are computers. They have infiltrated nearly every aspect of our lives. The hardware and software all come from the private sector. Apple, Google, Microsoft. They’re so big that they make Blackstone look puny. If government controlled the industry, Moore’s law would have been repealed long ago. Instead of facing an artificial intelligence apocalypse in the near future, it would still be safely decades away. I certainly applaud President Trump’s move to have the federal government own a piece of Intel, but isn’t that a bit too little too late?

And food. We all need to eat. Several times a day. Yet, incredibly, government owns or controls none of the food chain. Not farms, not markets, not restaurants. How can that be? New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s plan for municipal supermarkets is at least a small step in the right direction. Think about it: Everything on your plate got there as the result of the profit motive (i.e., greed). Gives me chills.

As Tallman also points out, health care is another area that shouldn’t be left to the private sector. Don’t listen to the critics who say that socialized medicine would have all the compassion of the Internal Revenue Service and all the efficiency of the post office. At least no one would be profiting from our pain.

I could go on, of course. There’s the media, communications, pharmaceuticals, banking, insurance. But I think you get the point. Government is simply more responsive and responsible than the private sector. And don’t forget that government is a huge employer here in the Land of Enchantment. More government ownership means more good-paying government jobs that aren’t in danger of layoffs as markets gyrate. Isn’t that what economic development is all about?

We can’t let the profit mongers win. Too much is at stake.

Perry Bendicksen toiled in the private sector for far too long. He retired and lives in Placitas.