[email protected] wrote: >If what you were suggesting was the case it would have the effect of changing >completely the existing social structure of the canals. This in turn would >have an effect on the canals themselves which you do not mention. How many of >the boaters brought in my your simple supply/demand analysis would bother >navigating the HNC or the BCN, for example? What price the survival of either >of these waterway?
I think that people paying more to use a waterway would/will expect/insist on more for their money, such as better maintenance and more attractive surroundings. If such standards were being achieved, I would expect plenty of use of your example waterways, as they are very interesting. >But it won't happen like you say. How many times do I have to remind you >Adrian that the pure economic models on which you base your high-sounding but >frequently specious arguments never WOULD work. Replace "remind you Adrian" with "claim based on inadequate reasoning". My answer to your is "Minus one". Bruce Napier <[email protected]> wrote: >as we sit here in the >economic and democratic wreckage resulting from the application of >the kind of economic pseudo-science peddled by Ayn Rand and the like >(greed is good, etc), he still slogs on arguing the case for it. C'mon! The real problem was incompetent regulation. And, of course, the government could have just let the badly-run banks (and car companies) go bust. I'm sure there would have been plenty of their competitors lining up to buy them at 3P (or whatever) in the pound, and keep them operating. However, our politicians decided to throw our money at the failures instead, seriously threatening our national economic health. Those who owned the failing businesses (e.g. bank shareholders) have been very seriously punished, as the value of their investments has been reduced to (almost) nothing. I can only hope the politicians suffer a similiar fate. AIUI, sales of "Atlas Shrugged" are currently very robust. More so than the book of one B. Obama. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/4965345/Ayn-Rands-Atlas-Shrugged-climbs-up-charts-during-recession.html "Roger Millin" <[email protected]> wrote: >Unless BW kill *all* the present boat building industry in this country (and >abroad) by raising the licence fee extortionately then the number of boats >being put on the water will always exceed the numbers leaving to go abroad or >being scrapped. Why? Or perhaps you accept that that number can be negative? >if they maintain the *present* licence fee, their income will rise according >to the numbers coming on to the system, minus those leaving/being scrapped >minus those (plenty) whose licences they cannot be bothered to enforce. >If they continue to raise the licence fee then their finances will continue to >rise at a rate that is governed by numbers launched minus boats going >abroad/scrapped minus those whose licences thay can't be bothered to enforce >multiplied by the licence fee increase for that year. >Seems like a win win situation to me in that they can only *slow* their total >revenue by licence increases. I doubt they'll be able to kill the increase all >together by strangling the golden goose. Roger is forgetting that the proportion of BW's total revenue coming from navigation charges is small. So increasing the number of boats doesn't increase BW's total revenue in proportion. Also, he has ignored "the point of diminishing returns". At present, it is clear that if BW raised its charges, its revenue would go *up*, because the increased revenue from the boats staying on the network and paying more would exceed that lost from the boats leaving the network. At some point, raising the charges will cause them to reach the point where the total revenue will cease to go up, because enough boats will have left (in total). That's the point at which BW maximises its income from navigation charges. As can be seen from the continuing increase in the number of boats, we aren't at (or, I think, near) that point yet. Trevor <[email protected]> wrote: >This argument does not hold water - some boaters may well take up >another hobby but there is absolutely no guarantee that these craft will >either be taken abroad or scrapped. > >A much more likely scenario is that these craft will fail to be properly >maintained, that more will fail or ignore their BSC and end up >unlicensed - and in the hands of the very people that some here so >obviously despise. Quite so. Which is why BW should be applauded with respect to its recent increased effort to remove unlicense boats from its waters. Many removed are scrapped, as they are unsaleable. >BW will *not* be ahead; revenue from those able and willing to pay may >possibly go up temporarily - but the end result will inevitably be self >defeating. Why? On your own argument, those that remain have decided to keep paying. >It occasionally comes across to me, as I read posts to this group, that >some of these people appear to be those who who would like the system >(and that system is one which we should always remember is actually >owned *by* the nation, and is therefore *for* the nation, and which was >certainly not originally intended to be reserved for just for a >privileged few) to be their *personal* preserve, and thus free from the >presence of the common man - there are, or so it seems to me, more than >a few archetypal NIMBYs present 'on the cut'. Indeed, the waterways are owned by the nation. But, as with every non-essential thing the nation owns, they need to produce a return. Or, at the very least, they need to be run with financial efficiency. That precludes giving away their benefits when those benefits can be sold. Charging for the waterways is also the fairest way to prevent their being over-used (because the only other approach is some kind of arbitrary, and thus inherently unfair, rationing). >BW, as we read here at regular intervals, is quite unable to maintain >the system properly; their available manpower 'on the ground' continues >to diminish at regular intervals - and that includes those whose duty >was once to police both the system and licenses. I think you're blaming the victim there. BW has of late been forced to reduce its staffing, as a result of unexpected and arbitrary cuts to its financial support from government. BW's problem with enforcement is that it uses a poor way of doing that enforcement. It it appropriately penalised those found keeping unlicensed boats, or mooring them unsuitably, the revenue from those penalties should not only pay for the enforcement activity, but also provide substantial additional revenue to BW. And I *do* blame BW for its poor enforcement approach. "Allan Cazaly" <[email protected]> wrote: >Why should the canals be limited to the pastime of the more wealthy of >society? It should not be governed by out-pricing the amenities for ordinary >people, like me. They shouldn't, and it shouldn't. Raising prices persuades some people to stop buying. In the case of the waterways, those are not "the poor", but are people who want to spend their leisure money on something else. There aren't many poor people boating. A poor person can't afford a boat. It is not a necessity for anyone to go boating. So what we are talking about here is discretionary spending. Under-pricing what is actually a luxury seems to me to be a very odd policy for government to adopt. Especially when it deprives the navigation authorities of money they badly need for maintenance. > Are the fishermen, cyclists and walkers going to be out-priced too, I ask > myself? It has proved rather difficult to find an economic way to charge cyclists and walkers each time they use the waterways (towpaths). I have no information about where the current prices of rod licences are compared to the point of diminishing returns, but I have heard that there has already been a considerable movement of piscators from the waterways to other waters. Adrian Adrian Stott 07956-299966
