the.com/privatization
the moment a government decides someone else should profit from its mistakes.
means The transfer of ownership or control of an industry, service, or asset from public (government) hands into private ones.
from Built from "private," which traces back through Old French to the Latin privatus — "set apart, belonging to oneself," the past participle of privare, "to separate or deprive" (the same root that gives us "deprive" and "privilege"). The "-ization" tail is the standard suffix for turning a state into a process. The word itself is a modern coinage, gaining real traction in the 20th century as governments began the business of selling off what was once held in common.
- first word
- Coined 'reprivatisierung' in Nazi Germany's 1930s economy
- thatcher era
- UK sold off gas, water, rail in the 1980s
- russia 1990s
- State assets vanished into oligarch hands overnight
- prison business
- US private prisons profit per inmate, per day
- water wars
- Bolivia's 2000 sell-off sparked deadly street uprisings
british telecom privatization — uk government sold 51% stake in 1984, raising £3.9 billion
uk rail privatization — conservative government broke up british rail and sold 25 regional franchises starting 1994-1997