This type of privatization can include the demutualization of a mutual organization, cooperative, or public-private partnership in order to form a joint-stock company.
[7] The term reprivatization, again translated directly from German (Reprivatisierung), was used frequently in the mid-1930s as The Economist reported on Nazi Germany's sale of nationalized banks back to public shareholders following the 1931 economic crisis.
Taoism came into prominence for the first time at a state level, and it advocated the laissez-faire principle of Wu wei (無為), literally meaning "do nothing".
The first mass privatization of state property occurred in Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1937: "It is a fact that the government of the National Socialist Party sold off public ownership in several state-owned firms in the middle of the 1930s.
The firms belonged to a wide range of sectors: steel, mining, banking, local public utilities, shipyard, ship-lines, railways, etc.
After 1979, council house tenants in the UK were given the right to buy their homes at a heavily discounted price; one million had purchased their residences by 1986.
The privatization was controversial, and its impact is still debated today, as doubling of passenger numbers and investment was balanced by an increase in rail subsidy.
Following his overthrow in the 2011 revolution, most of the public began to call for re-nationalization, citing allegations of the privatized firms practicing crony capitalism under the old regime.
Many governments, therefore, elect for listings in more sophisticated markets, for example, Euronext, and the London, New York and Hong Kong stock exchanges.
Voucher privatization occurred mainly in the transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe, such as Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia.
[26] Through privatization by direct asset sale or the stock market, bidders compete to offer higher prices, generating more revenue for the state.
Voucher privatization, on the other hand, could represent a genuine transfer of assets to the general population, creating a sense of participation and inclusion.
[27] This interpretation is particularly argued to apply to recent municipal transactions in the United States, particularly for fixed term, such as the 2008 sale of the proceeds from Chicago parking meters for 75 years.
It is argued that this is motivated by "politicians' desires to borrow money surreptitiously",[27] due to legal restrictions on and political resistance to alternative sources of revenue, viz, raising taxes or issuing debt.
[30] According to research performed by the World Bank[31] and William L. Megginson[32] in the early 2000s, privatization in competitive industries with well-informed consumers, consistently improved efficiency.
[33] Such efficiency gains mean a one-off increase in GDP, but through improved incentives to innovate and reduce costs also tend to raise the rate of economic growth.
In the first attempt at a social welfare analysis of the British privatization program under the Conservative governments of Margaret Thatcher and John Major during the 1980s and 1990s, Massimo Florio points to the absence of any productivity shock resulting strictly from ownership change.
[37] A 2012 study published by the European Commission argues that privatisation in Europe had mixed effects on service quality and has achieved only minor productivity gains, driven mainly by lower labour input combined with other cost cutting strategies that led to a deterioration of employment and working conditions.
[43][full citation needed] Other research suggests that privatization in Russia resulted in a dramatic rise in the level of economic inequality and a collapse in GDP and industrial output.
"[48] A subsequent body of scholarship, while still controversial, demonstrates that rapid privatization schemes associated with neoliberal economic reforms did result in poorer health outcomes in former Eastern Bloc countries during the transition to markets economies, with the World Health Organization contributing to the debate by stating "IMF economic reform programs are associated with significantly worsened tuberculosis incidence, prevalence, and mortality rates in post-communist Eastern European and former Soviet countries.
"[49] Historian Walter Scheidel, a specialist in ancient history, posits that economic inequality and wealth concentration in the top percentile "had been made possible by the transfer of state assets to private owners.
"[50] In Latin America, on the one hand, according to John Nellis's research for Center for Global Development, economic indicators, including firm profitability, productivity, and growth, project positive microeconomic results.
In essence, whenever societies move towards increasingly unrestrained, free-market rule, a natural and inevitable societal correction emerges to undermine the contradictions of capitalism.
[51] In India, a survey by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) – Utilization of Free Medical Services by Children Belonging to the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) in Private Hospitals in New Delhi, 2011–12: A Rapid Appraisal – indicates under-utilization of the free beds available for EWS category in private hospitals in Delhi, though they were allotted land at subsidized rates.
The report from the inquiry "Taking Back Control" [53][full citation needed] made a range of recommendations to provide accountability and transparency in the process.
[58] Due to low levels of native capital accumulation in the former Central and Eastern Europe, the rapid privatization preferred by international institutions (EBRD, IMF, World Bank) and other foreign banks was a de facto call for international bidding, reflecting the assumption that foreign investment would play a major role.
[59] In post-reunification East Germany, by the end of June 1992, the Treuhandanstalt had privatized 8,175 companies, with 5,950 left on hand (4,340 remaining to be sold and the remainder to be liquidated).
Proponents of privatization argue that, over time, this can lead to lower prices, improved quality, more choices, less corruption, less red tape, and/or quicker delivery.
Some national constitutions in effect define their governments' "core businesses" as being the provision of such things as justice, tranquility, defense, and general welfare.
These governments' direct provision of security, stability, and safety, is intended to be done for the common good (in the public interest) with a long-term (for posterity) perspective.