Do classical liberals support privatization of the public lands?
Some free-market environmentalists do believe that privatization is the best solution to public land controversies. But the Thoreau Institute considers privatization to be neither necessary nor sufficient to improve public land management. Privatization won’t, for example, necessarily save taxpayers any money. After all, the nation’s 400 million acres of private farm lands (crop lands) receive an average of nearly $50 of federal tax subsidies per acre per year. By comparison, the nation’s 600 million acres of federal lands receive less than $10 of federal tax subsidies per acre per year. Instead of privatization, the Thoreau Institute advocates marketization. This means four things: • Public land managers should be allowed to charge fair market value for all resources, including recreation. • National forests, national parks, and other public lands should be funded exclusively out of a share of the net user fees they earn. • Public land permits, which are now all written on a use-it-or
