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Path: utzoo!watmath!looking!brad
From: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: High Duties => Increased Competitiveness?
Message-ID: <437@looking.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 13-Oct-85 00:45:28 EDT
Article-I.D.: looking.437
Posted: Sun Oct 13 00:45:28 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 14-Oct-85 03:48:29 EDT
References: <2591@watcgl.UUCP> <36@ubc-cs.UUCP> <39@ubc-cs.UUCP> <1714@dciem.UUCP>
Reply-To: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton)
Organization: Looking Glass Software Ltd. Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 63
Summary: 

In article <1714@dciem.UUCP> mmt@dciem.UUCP (PUT YOUR NAME HERE) writes:
>
>If you carry this through to its logical conclusion, you must include
>the problem of unnatural geographic monopoly, as well.  Canada is a most
>unnatural country, that has been held together only by communication
>subsidies to long-distance communication, and by a distaste for being
>swallowed by the USA.  The former, I think, has been more vital.
>In my ideal Canada, Canadian citizens would travel free on any carrier
>(e.g. mostly Newfoundland businesses).  If we, as Canadians, want Newfoundland
>to belong to Canada, we should give them the same opportunities that
>Central Canadians enjoy.  The same applies to the Far North.  I think
>that the charges to individuals and businesses should increase with distance
>within Canada, but only slightly, and the real cost excess should be

	The point is that in an artificial situation like this you
	destroy the country by stagnating the long distance
	communications and transportation industries.  Without a proper
	profit incentive, people aren't going to go out searching for
	ways to make these things more efficient.  This is the usual
	result of quick-fix interventionist solutions.  With an artificial
	fixed rate, people don't go out and invent things like communications
	satellites and fiber optics.  What's worse for Canada, when we have
	an artificial structure and the USA does not, these things get
	invented in the USA.  And then all we can do is complain about
	brain drain and having to import our high-tech.  Enforced monopolies
	have a *very strong* vested interest in maintaining the status quo.
	True innovation normally only comes when there is the big bucks
	incentive.
>paid by the taxpayer in the interests of Canadian unity (much like the
>infamous Crow's Nest Pass rates, which did not work as fairly as my
>suggestion).  Non-Canadian businesses and non-resident individuals
>would pay normal costs for long-distance travel in Canada, to prevent
>them from taking advantage of the subsidy for the benefit of the USA.
	How could they take advantage of a subsidy in shipments from Whitehorse
	to St. John to help the USA?  Why should we wish to punish our
	foreign neighbours?  Is it because of their nationality?  To me
	that's not much different from doing it because of the colour of
	their skin.
>This logic applies equally to the Post Office, since all mail starting
>or stopping in Canada is for the benefit of Canada.
	What is this "Canada" but its people?  Why not let the people
	decide instead of having you (or your bretheren) get together
	and decide what is good for "Canada"
>
>Of course, if you want to make everything natural, Canada (and the USA)
>should break up into smallish autonomous regions which associate according
>to similarity of interests and ease of internal communication.  But I
>can't accept that you want Canada to continue, and at the same time want
>to have the users pay the true and full costs of communication over
>long distances.  Those positions are incompatible.
	Perhaps some people don't want your vision of Canada to continue.
	There is no reason your vision should get special status.
	For most people, the definition of Canada is "the country I
	live in."  or "a free nation devoted to peace, order and good
	government."  All this other stuff has been made up by various
	pressure groups and it certainly isn't *my* vision of Canada.
>Martin Taylor
>{allegra,linus,ihnp4,floyd,ubc-vision}!utzoo!dciem!mmt
>{uw-beaver,qucis,watmath}!utcsri!dciem!mmt


-- 
Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473