Why Governments can't grit the roads

I am indebted to Mr E for introducing me to the BBC's excellent Point Of View (yes, that is praise for the BBC, but with all that money even monkeys would get something right). I take it on podcast and when I first started listening it was written and narrated by Clive James. He hung up his pen and microphone at the end of the year and made way for Lisa Jardine.

Her first couple of attempts were a bit weak and I was just going to delete the iTunes entry when she came up with this post on gritting to show why markets are netter than central planning:

On the other hand, as the winter freeze has proved more serious and of longer duration than forecasters predicted, so the government and local authorities, who find themselves without sufficient supplies of salt and grit, have been roundly chastised for their lack of foresight.

This supposed inability to get essential commodities to where they are needed is considered unforgiveable in the highly developed consumer world in which we live.

The efficient movement of retail goods from point of supply to point of demand is one of the marvels of modern computerised planning, and we take it for granted.

It goes on to give a potted history of how the market deals with nightmarish logistical problems to route round problems and bring us goods that we want at ever cheaper prices:

Da Gama's successful first voyage had an immediate impact on European pepper prices. In 1501 Girolamo Priuli, a Venetian nobleman, recorded in his diary:

"Now that this new route is found, the King of Portugal will bring all the spices to Lisbon. And there is no doubt that the Hungarians, Germans, Flemish and French, who formerly came to Venice to spend their money on spices, will all turn towards Lisbon, for it is nearer to them, and easier to reach.

"Furthermore [he went on], spices via this route will be better priced. The mark up for transit through the countries of the Sultan and Venice is so great that whatever the spices cost in Calicut in ducats, the price in Venice has to be multiplied sixty or a hundred times."

Five centuries on, supermarket chains in a highly competitive market know that getting the goods consumers want into the right location at the right time is still the way to maximize profit.

I liked this bit which might have be described as summing up I, Pencil in a single paragraph.

It seems that logistics is more powerful at accurately predicting needs when its strategies are based upon large numbers of individual consumer transactions, so that the data can give a better statistical model.

She then goes to solving the problem in an almost libertarian way:

Perhaps if Britain - like the United States and much of Europe - had a law requiring householders to clear the pavement outside their property of snow and ice, customers would demand an adequate supply of materials, logistics would anticipate that seasonal demand, and supermarkets would stock rock salt and grit in winter.

Supply and demand has also, as it happens, controlled the distribution of swine flu vaccine in America. There you purchase your H1N1 shots from your local pharmacy.

OK, so there's a bit of compulsion, but we can't have everything. I'm sure that if this was proposed we'd have the usual Guardianistas screaming about the elderly and infirm (and lazy), but they get round this problem in Europe so I'm sure we will. How long would it take for neighbours or charities to step in an help? That's what happened when we were snowed in last week, we all helped those who couldn't, including going shopping. And how long would it take the market to step in with people clearing snow for a couple of pounds? Not long I bet.

Either get the podcast or go and read the whole thing, it really is worth the investment of some time.