Yes yes yes. I remember back when Arnold Schwarzeneggar was governor of California. (I’m SMH right now. What weird dystopia is this state? We elected a steroid-damaged bodybuilder-actor. And, he was more sensible than Trump, and a more practical than some of the CA Republican Party.) He tried to push selling off state owned property. That’s what the ultracapitalists want: the privatization of everything that’s necessary to survive, so they can extract a profit from it.
I’m skeptical of his strategy, though. Do we really have the power to replace fence-sitters and sellouts? Won’t most flip against privatization once there’s evidence of political power?
This is the Playbook around the world. Governments invest in public goods and rich people attempt to seize them for pennies on the dollar when there is some sort of economic downturn. This happened in Greece most recently. Here’s a nice overview. https://www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/the-deception-of-privatisation-in-greece/
Something else that should be mentioned about Greece. In some sense the Libertarian Model was used to bankrupt the state. For a variety of reasons, Independent contractors model was promoted leading to 30% people becoming self employed. The numbers in France and Germany are 10% and 11% respectively. The independent contractor is used to undermine tax revenue collection through tax evasion. The countries in Yurp that had economic difficulties are often the ones with the highest Self Employment. https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/4753.jpeg
It’s not enough to fight against privatization. We have to address the fact that so many utilities are private companies. We have to revise our misunderstanding of history about things like the Los Angeles “Red Lines” streetcars, which people imagine were public transit, but were really a real-estate profiteering scheme.
We have to revise our understanding that Affordable Housing is a private market scheme to enable gentrification, not a permanent increase in the stock of public housing or nonprofit housing.
Knowing this, we can make a rhetorical demand for actual public ownership and public services.
