Freedomain Radio

Oneironaut:

I have a question regarding the service lines for utility companies...

Currently, the government grants monopolies to utility companies primarily in an attempt to reduce the construction and maintenance costs of roads, sewers, etc. However, the government also regulates the prices of those granted monopolies. In a free-market, how would this differ? It seems that it would be very possible for road companies to enter into contracts granting utility companies monopolies to service the buildings that their roads run to. Yet, these road companies are not necessarily under any obligation to regulate the prices of their utility company business-partners. 

I cannot seem to come up with my own solution to this problem. Can anyone please offer a reasonable solution?

The government has no such objective. They are just like any other human being happiness seeking organisms. The only difference is that they have guns and control over people that point these guns to whomever they want. In a free society there can be no monopoly and there is no one to grant a monopoly to someone else. There can always be more roads and more utilities.

You should read "Healing Our World In An Age Of Aggression". It addresses this exact situation with regards to the phone companies.

Also, consider television and Internet. Cable companies have a monopoly, but there are other technologies---satellites, DSL, power lines, WiMAX, etc. The same thing could happen with other utilities.

well if some company does get a monoply it isnt that bad,it only means this spesiphic service is quite stagnents and not very profitable,and the services of different companies dont differ very much from one another,the problem only starts when monopolies artificailly jack up prices because of their exculsivity in that market,but when they do that the market becomes more atractive for other companies to under cut the monopoly in order to make profit,so the monopoly wont just over price like that because it knows that would happon and so it is likely to maintain status que.

hope that sort of covers what i wanted to say

Oneironaut:

I have a question regarding the service lines for utility companies...

Currently, the government grants monopolies to utility companies primarily in an attempt to reduce the construction and maintenance costs of roads, sewers, etc. However, the government also regulates the prices of those granted monopolies. In a free-market, how would this differ? It seems that it would be very possible for road companies to enter into contracts granting utility companies monopolies to service the buildings that their roads run to. Yet, these road companies are not necessarily under any obligation to regulate the prices of their utility company business-partners. 

I cannot seem to come up with my own solution to this problem. Can anyone please offer a reasonable solution?

In a free market, the customer 'regulates' the price of a good or service by offering only so much for it.

Where future price increases can be dangerous, the customer simply negotiates them up front for a fixed amount of time, as in a mortgage...

Does that help?