solidsnack9000

I am not in state government -- not in government at all -- and can't obtain power for myself if zoning, building codes, laws for lawns and curbs, &c, become a matter where the state claims the whole field of legislation.

To return to your earlier comment, homes as the primary investment vehicle are, indeed, an obstacle to my mind -- but I reach that conclusion in a different way. It doesn't make sense to have so much capital tied up in residences, a fundamentally unproductive asset.

But aren't there other salient factors? Is energy policy any less "big" than zoning in its effect on your local environment? The thing is, it's just really hard to get certain policies to work right when they are set at too small a scale -- even if they have a big effect at a small scale.

When I consider the housing situation, I am starting to think that land use policy seems to be that kind of thing.

Ultimately, cities are granted a charter by the state. It's not a given that they can control zoning, the location of people's garage doors, &c. We can think about these things and decide.

He is not really quite what you would get if zoning, &c, were handled at the state level.

The distinction between public and private companies is deeply meaningful for someone like you, who wants to see reforms in corporate governance.

You just want the problem to be solved, by someone else, without having to think too hard about it -- that is the way a lot of people feel. This is abdicating any real say in what actually happens, though.

This is one reason that companies doing "the business of business" are here -- because of people doing business the other way while not really knowing what they are doing. They pile up some combination of assets, good will, procedures and human capital but can't get the combination to balance profit and loss -- so someone else comes along and buys them and uses a more functional approach to actually get the business to work.

There are so many people who sincerely want the right thing to happen but then look at the mechanics of getting it to happen and say, this is meaningless, tedious, &c. They don't really get to be a part of the solution (though they will find their capital and efforts drawn into the problem unawares, often enough).

Learn about these things and know the difference between public and private companies.

Well, that is actually a wild thing to say. How could it not be a sellable thing?

The people who presently own the business have a property interest in it -- that's fundamental.

...once you admit that there can be restrictions on property rights, it's unclear how property rights in and of themselves is a steelman of private equity. Why not just say that "you can't sell to private equity" is one of the restrictions?

What do you think that would look like in practice? Private equity is investment in non-public companies -- the purchase of shares in non-public companies or the purchase of the companies outright. In many cases, the private equity firms themselves are public; but in many cases, they are private, as well.

There isn't a way to make a rule that "you can't sell to private equity" but there can be a rule like "you can't sell a private company at all" or "public investment funds can not purchase shares in private companies" -- if you try a few of the variations that are possible, you'll see that they're all bad rules, I think.

You really have to think about hard about what you mean by "a private equity company". It's not as easy as it looks. If a manufacturing firm starts to buy up suppliers (many of which are small, private entities), is it a private equity company? It's buying up non-public companies.

Private equity is investment in non-public companies. A lot of good has come from investment in non-public companies over the years.

Why can't all investment be in public companies? Not every company can go public: the regulatory and administrative requirements are high. Why are they high? To protect public investors -- to protect the general public.

In the past, many people put together fraudulent enterprises, sought investment from the public and then walked away with the money, perhaps even pretending to run the business for a while so there was convincing failure story. The regulatory and administrative requirements are there to make this harder, by requiring certain governance and reporting procedures.

The requirements are high enough that a new venture can not get started by going to public markets -- and in fact may run for several years before it is able to.