this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2025
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List a country with a decent population of like at least 50 mio people that competes with companies successfully and fairly. Countries with a smaller population don't have as much of a bureaucratic overhead. But even there... where do they offer a better service in a fair competition with companies
I would argue that "bureaucratic overhead" is missing in companies at least as much as it is excess in governments. These double checks and regulations help guard against things like companies externalizing environmental and health impacts. They also act as a check on tendencies towards consolidation (or rather should). Consequently, companies appear to operate more efficiently, but we will have to pay to clean up and handle their externalities eventually.
I'm all for legislation that properly makes companies price in external effects. What I do not support is the state taking an active role in the market. Legislation is created for a reason but needs to be reformed and slimmed down once in a while. The government does not adjust fast enough imo and I think it should focus on core tasks instead of creating search engines.
You are posting on a social media platform solely funded by the EU.
But I've heard the USPS is not shit either. Publicly funded and run universities in the EU also provide the same or better service as those in the US for pennies on the dollar. Also, a lot of European railways are state run, like a lot of other public transit companies.
Also, the only space agencies that ever got to the moon were public. So were the ones that put the first man in space, and the first man on the moon, and the one that sent the first satellite into orbit and the farthest man-made object from Earth.
Look, the goverment is good at providing a good starter set of things you need for life. Infrastructure has no real competition so the infrastructure needs to be state owned since we can't have it fail. I would look favorably if the government funded an open initiative to build a FOSS search index... but I think a search engine isn't something like core infrastructure that can only reasonably exist once.
Besides... SearxNG is just a relay engine and if every european used it and relayed the search request to other search engines without them getting a dime I don't think that would be fair.
Lemmy also isn't developed by the state. It might get funding from the goverment but thats a very different thing - Core research that doesn't have a straight up ROI is also one of the things where everyone benefits of it long term falls under something the government should do. I just don't think the government is good at running an economical business and I can't imagine living in a country where every company was like state-run with a top-down system. Competition is good, what we have is a lack of competition
You asked me to name a good service a government provides for a large number of people successfully. I named several. I get that you have ideological problems with goverments doing stuff, but governments not doing stuff results in what you can see in the US right now.
The original post is also not about a hypothetical ideological question, but that the US government was captured and dismantled by its corporations, and those corporations want to continue that societal rot over here. The EU cannot tolerate that.
Google neither competes fairly nor provides a good service. We have to endure them because they have made investment in a competitor uneconomical.
I have switched away from google mostly. Most people can do so too. Yes they do have a monopoly on search and I think the government should take steps to ensure fair competition but I don't think the ban hammer should be wielded this lightly. If they pay the fine. Searxng is just a relay search engine and I doubt it is legal for such a big instance to use search engines as back end, have them run it for free and then have the people use Searx instead.
This is a great way to do nothing and let the problem fester. The attitude behind every rotten thing we have to deal with now.
Hydroquebec, alternative power practically doesn't exist in quebev because hydroquebec kicks ass
I don't think anyone could legally compete with hydro not that they could because we invested as a society into exploiting pur natural ressources for the common good of our population rather than the good of some dickhead.
Result: cheapest electricity price on the continent.