Well, of course the idea is being pushed now because trade deals make privatization virtually irreversible.
It begun with the 1994 WTO "GATS" agreement, which makes privatization and globalization of
committed services mandatory
if they are partially commercialized already,(for example, schools going private because of charter schools and for profit colleges make a educational commodity commercial, eliminating the 'right' to education) its advocates claim its opt in (for example the US committed to privatize/globalize health insurance - actually, health insurance being a financial service, changes are being rolled back, because we committed to freeze regulation of financial services at 1998 levels.)
SOME OF THE FOLLOWING IS SARCASM...
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Toll roads only open to expensive self driving cars would be an "au natural" way to restrict travel between poor and wealthy areas in the job-sparse future.
See below..
This text is from an article archived on the IATP website. The graphics are from a
presentation given to PSI by Jane Kelsey (of New Zealand).
They all use the following problematic definition of what their scope can be.
(Basically "everything you cannot drop on your foot".)
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The GATS "governmental authority" exclusionArticle I:3 of the agreement states:
"For the purposes of this Agreement...
(b)
'services' includes any service in any sector except services supplied in the exercise of
governmental authority;
(c)
'a service supplied in the exercise of governmental authority' means any service which is supplied
neither on a commercial basis, nor in competition with one or more service suppliers." The "governmental authority" exclusion is very narrow
This exclusion is far narrower than it may at first appear.
Firstly, in order for a service to be excluded,
both criteria must apply.
That is, in order for the exclusion to apply, a service must be supplied on a noncommercial basis and its delivery must not be in competition with another service supplier. Thus, the exclusion does not apply to services that are supplied on a noncommercial basis but which are
supplied in competition with another service provider.
Similarly, the exclusion does not apply to services that are supplied on a commercial basis even where these services are supplied in the absence of competition with any other service supplier. Hence, only a small subset of services those that are provided by completely noncommercial,
absolute monopolies appear to be protected by this exclusion.
Secondly, the exclusion is narrow by virtue of the ordinary definition of its terms. The agreement does not define the
phrases "on a commercial basis" and "in competition with one or more service suppliers". However, the ordinary
definitions of these terms are broad, making the set of services that they describe very large, and the set of services
that falls outside them and hence outside the scope of the agreement quite small.
"Commercial" is defined variously as: "Engaged in commerce; trading" 5 ; "Of or pertaining to
commerce or trade" 6 ; "Of, engaged in, or concerned with, commerce" 7 ; or "concerned with
commerce" 8 (emphases added).
The definition of "commerce" includes: "financial transactions, esp. the buying and selling of
merchandise, on a large scale" 9 , "the exchange of goods" 10 or "buying and selling together; trading;
exchange of merchandise" 11 .
The definition of "trade" includes: "the business of distribution, selling and exchange" 12 , "buying and
selling ... buying and selling conducted between nations etc.; the exchange of goods between
peoples" 13 and "the buying and selling or exchange of commodities for profit; commerce, traffic,
trading" 14 .
"Competition" is defined as: "Rivalry in the market, striving for custom between those who have the
same commodities to dispose of" 15 ; "the act or an instance of competing or contending with others (for
supremacy, a position, a prize, etc.)." 16
"Compete" is defined as: "to try to get what others also seek and which all cannot have, to compete
for export markets". 17
Source:
http://www.iatp.org/files/GATS_and_Public_Service_Systems.htmIn short, privatization of roads is an ideal way to make society more unequal and less mobile.