Drew Carey: The Price, as Determined by the Unfettered Machinations of Private Enterprise, Is Right

So yesterday at Tuned In, we talked about economic free marketeers on TV, and about Drew Carey. Well, friends, it all circles back--to an (online) TV show by economic free-marketeer Drew Carey. In addition to hosting Power of Ten and The Price Is Right, Carey has started hosting webcasts for reason.tv, the video webcasting arm of libertarian political mag Reason. In the segment above, he visits commuters around the L.A. era to argue that Los Angeles traffic jams could be mitigated if we allowed private companies to build highways and charge tolls on them. (He cites examples from Australia and that hotbed of libertarianism, France.)

Disclosure: I subscribe to Reason, and I agree with them on a lot, especially on civil liberties and sometimes on economics. Still, it's worth noting that (1) Carey has little to say about mass transit, except to bash it and (2) I'm skeptical how much better private companies can make the driving experience, considering how they've made commercial airflight such a delight. But again, this isn't a business blog. If nothing else, by raising a provocative proposal about a real problem, Carey at least manages to make a segment that's more thought-provoking than any transportation feature I've seen on TV news lately. Also, funnier.

And really, is there any better game show for a free-market libertarian to host than The Price Is Right?