You can substitute the Philippines for Chicago, Transco for the parking meter and you get what happened to the transmission part of the Philippines Power System.
Hiring private companies to handle city services is a two-edged sword. I believe our Mayor Daley now regrets he signed a 75-year-lease with a company to take over the city’s parking meters. There was a time when Chicagoans grumbled about parking fees but figured, well, they’re a lot less than in New York. These bandits came in and immediately quadrupled parking meter fees. In the Loop, an hour which in 2008 cost a quarter now costs $3.50.
Has this resulted in windfall income for the city? No, according to the Chicago News Cooperative. Daley got a $600 million upfront payment, and will spend that amount in two years. Chicago gets $1.15 billion over 75 years. But wait! Wait! The deal is good for Private Enterprise, right? Conservatives like Rumsfeld even wanted to privatize the U. S. military. At least stockholders can profit from our parking meters. That’s good, or it would be, if 25% of the new meter company weren’t owned by Abu Dhabi’s Sovereign Wealth Funds, another 24% by German investors, and the rest by Morgan Stanley.
As nearly as anyone can figure out: (1) Chicago would have made more money owning the meters itself, (2) Parking Meters LLC is making money hand over fist because it quadruped the charge for a fixed-cost service, and (3) Chicago business is hurting because retail customers resist paying $3.50 an hour, or up to $29 fee in parking garages after you stay more than 15 minutes — or one hour, or whatever. Parking garages fees have doubled. Now most retail stores offer discount parking if they stamp your ticket — which costs them money, so they’re paying Abu Dhabi too. It doesn’t take Stephen Hawking to figure out that Abu Dhabi and Morgan Stanley wouldn’t have come anywhere near our parking meters unless they knew they could clean up. Chicago got taken to the cleaners.
via The gathering storm – Roger Ebert’s Journal.