How might, then, a competitive private mountain ownership system reduce the need for the services of NSS&R (they would be the first to welcome such an eventuality, since they want to save lives, not build an empire).
https://walterblock.substack.com/p/an-economist-looks-at-north-shore
British Columbia’s North Shore Search and Rescue group is a very impressive organization. Over the years they have saved the lives of numerous hikers and skiers in the mountains to the north of Vancouver. It’s a private undertaking, financed by voluntary contributions. They have their own helicopters. Dozens of highly-skilled staff pilot these vehicles, go down on ropes to pick up the wounded, whisk them off to hospitals. They have their own doctors to assist with those in need. Sometimes, all too often, weather conditions interfere with or preclude their efforts, and all they can take out of the dangerous mountainous trails are human remains, which greatly saddens them.
They are heroes, a credit to this great country of ours.
How might an economist look at this organization? One question is the dollars spent per lives saved. How does it compare with other efforts to save lives, such as efforts to quell heart disease or cancer or obesity or smoking or traffic fatalities. The goal, presumably, is to equalize this statistic across all such efforts to maximize the bang for the buck in terms of lives saved. For if one avenue is more efficient than others, more money should be allocated in that direction to maximize results.
Another consideration is to realize that specialization and the division of labour are integral aspects of the dismal science. North Shore Search and Rescue only steps in when people are in trouble. But what about prevention?
The difficulty is that private enterprise does not heretofore play much of a role in this aspect of life saving. Why? Mainly because the government owns much of land in the mountains. How could privatization help reduce the demand for the always necessary services of NSS&R?
Here are the names of some of the mountains that lie to the North of West and North Vancouver: Grouse, Seymour, Black, Hollyburn, Strachan, Unnecessary, Lions, Goat, Dam, Crown, Fromme and Lynn. Imagine a scenario where all of them were fully privatized; there would be one owner for each.
A basic finding of economics is that competition brings about a better product at a lower price. The reason we have pretty good and relatively cheap shoes, socks, bicycles, computers, heaters, air conditioners, pens, pencils, paper clips, rubber bands, furniture, ketchup, bread, etc., is because these industries are run on a competitive basis. This also accounts for why the immigration traffic was from East to West Germany, from North to South Korea, and not the other way around.
How might, then, a competitive private mountain ownership system reduce the need for the services of NSS&R (they would be the first to welcome such an eventuality, since they want to save lives, not build an empire). It would be simple. Each owner would set up his own “rules of the road” and we would then be able to determine which system better promotes the safety of skiers, hikers, bikers, snowshoe walkers, etc.
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