Having worked for, and been a victimized consumer, of both private and public enterprises, I find little difference in their effectiveness or their intrinsic virtue. Both have a primary check, the private must contend with the market, the public must satisfy the voter. These mechanisms eventually moderate the worst abuses, but there is a substantial amount of inertia (a direct function of the size of the organization) which allows a lot of damage to occur before the checks and balances finally kick in.

Private and public also interact with each other, and are competitive to a certain extent, which I believe is good because it helps to disperse power (thesis + antithesis = synthesis) but even this mechanism can be overestimated in its effectiveness and often works in precisely the opposite way it should. The public side has regulation, the law and the courts, and the guns. In the short run, it can always get what it wants.

But in the long run, the private has the jobs and the money. It also has lawyers, lobbyists, trade organizations, advertising, public relations, campaign financing and a host of other mechanisms designed primarily to manipulate government. The best we can hope for is a standoff, and so far, in this country, we seem to be doing ok.

What we must never let happen is for either side to succeed in convincing us it is being abused by the other. The two are indistinguishable, guys in suits who want money and power, and who will jump from one side to the other in a moment if it advances their own careers. Lawyers, politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen all share the same pathology. The mom and pop grocery has about as much to do with business as the New England Town Meeting has to do with politics.

The first sign of the con is when one side, convinced of its moral superiority, operational efficiency and effectiveness, tries to tell us how it is being manipulated and abused by the evil, inept, and bumbling minions of the other. It's like the Nazis, who were always complaining how the totally inferior Jews were on the verge of taking over the entire world.