The Joys of Privatization

Jonah Goldberg writes in the Los Angeles Times — reproduced on Real Clear Politics —about how Dianne Feinstein improved the Senate lunch room by putting it under private management. Here’s an excerpt:

According to auditors, the chain of restaurants run by the Senate food service, including the snooty Senate Dining Room, has almost never been in the black. It’s lost more than $18 million since 1993 and has dropped about $2 million this year alone. If the food service doesn’t get an emergency bridge loan of a quarter-million dollars, it won’t be able to make payroll.

So how will the Senate fix the problem? Well, with California Sen. Dianne Feinstein taking the lead, the Democrats — that’s right, the Democrats — have called a classic Republican play: Privatize it.

The House of Representatives made the switch in the 1980s, and its food service is now better. And profitable: The House has made $1.2 million in commissions since 2003. True to the Founders’ vision of the Senate as the more slow-moving branch of government, the Senate has taken 20 years to follow suit.

This was a painful decision for many Democrats who believe that privatization cannot be justified simply because it delivers better service and higher quality for less money. “What about the workers?” they cried. Apparently, some Democrats feel that the top priority in the restaurant business is to generate paychecks for people who are bad at their jobs.

Feinstein, head of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, was forced to deal with reality. “It’s cratering,” the Washington Post quoted Feinstein as saying. “Candidly, I don’t think the taxpayers should be subsidizing something that doesn’t need to be. There are parts of government that can be run like a business and should be run like businesses.”

Yes, yes, go on, Dianne. Run with that thought. Explore it, as the therapists say.