"If the costs of producing public goods stays constant or is lowered by technology, then as the population and investment in the neighborhood increases, the size that a dominant stakeholder needs to be in order to provide the most important units of a public good decreases."
Underrated point. Unfortunately, we see most of our "community technologies" (as I like to call them) like roads and policing rising in cost despite the deflationary power of technological innovation.
IMO "cost disease" isn't actually an explanation of anything. The question is why aren't capital and technology being deployed in such a way that labor productivity *can* increase in diseased sectors. The answer usually appears to be "too little entrepreneurship."
"If the costs of producing public goods stays constant or is lowered by technology, then as the population and investment in the neighborhood increases, the size that a dominant stakeholder needs to be in order to provide the most important units of a public good decreases."
Underrated point. Unfortunately, we see most of our "community technologies" (as I like to call them) like roads and policing rising in cost despite the deflationary power of technological innovation.
Yeah that's right. Combination of cost disease and institutional failure.
BTW if you like Olson you might like a piece I wrote forever ago trying to expand his logic via behavioral econ: https://athousandnations.com/2011/05/23/state-legitimacy-as-status-quo-bias/
IMO "cost disease" isn't actually an explanation of anything. The question is why aren't capital and technology being deployed in such a way that labor productivity *can* increase in diseased sectors. The answer usually appears to be "too little entrepreneurship."
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/06/what-is-degrowth-economics-climate-change/