[LINK] Telstra propose biggest rollout in Australia's history

[Craig Sanders]

On Thu, Jan 18, 2007 at 07:26:14AM +1100, Jan Whitaker wrote:
> At 11:31 PM 17/01/2007, Frank O'Connor wrote:
> >>Two words: corporate welfare.
> >
> >Mmmm ... I predicted Telstra would make a play for the lions share 
> >of what's in the trough 12 months back - even as they were saying 
> >that servicing the country was uneconomic.
> 
> Three words: uneconomic for whom?
> 
> It's no skin off the Sol's nose (or bankbook) if the funding comes 
> from the taxpayer. Gee, you'd think we still had publicly owned 
> telco! What is it with people here? The point of privatisation is to 
> let the investors make the CAPITAL investment (see, that's the way 
> CapitalISM is supposed to work - I learned that in ECO 101). 

whatever gave you that silly idea?

the point of capitalism is that the investors reap the profits. if they
can offload the expenses onto someone else, then so much the better.

and the point of privatisation is to offload any public infrastructure
that has any chance of making a profit into private hands - and give the
government a short-term windfall to plough back into corporate welfare
(and a bit of pork-barreling on the side - watch how much of the T3
proceeds gets spent getting Howard & Co re-elected this year).


craig

-- 
craig sanders <cas at taz.net.au>           (part time cyborg)