The British lighthouse system and its evolution
In the UK, the institutions that build and maintain lighthouses vary from place to place. In England and Wales it is the Pilot Guild, in Scotland it is the Northern Lighthouse Board. In Ireland it is the Irish Lighthouse Board. Expenses for these agencies are funded by the General Lighthouse Fund, which is administered by the Department of Commerce. The source of income for the fund is the lighthouse tax paid by ship owners. The payment and report management of the lighthouse tax are the responsibility of the pilot association, and the tax collection is completed by the port tax bureau. In addition, the Lighthouse Advisory Committee (a shipping association representing ship owners, marine underwriters and freight forwarders) also plays an important role. The opinions of the Lighthouse Committee will be considered when the Lighthouse Agency prepares its budget and whether the Department of Commerce passes the budget.
The current lighthouse system in the UK has been determined through historical evolution. The history of its evolution is of great help to our understanding of the supply of public products. Coase mainly introduced the historical evolution of the lighthouse system in England and Wales. The evolution of this system has mainly gone through the following stages:
Admiralty of the Admiralty and Pilot Association. At the beginning of the 16th century, there were almost no lighthouses in England, but there were various navigational beacons. The management of these navigational beacons and the provision of beacons were the responsibility of the Lord Admiralty. In 1566, the Pilot Guild was given the power to provide and manage navigation aids and also oversee the management of private navigation aids. In 1594, the Lord Admiralty transferred the management of buoys and beacons to the pilot guilds. It can be said that although there was no lighthouse at this time, the navigation beacons that played a similar role as a lighthouse were jointly provided by the government and the pilot association.
Pilot associations and private individuals built lighthouses. In the early seventeenth century, the Pilot Guilds erected lighthouses at Custer and Lowestoft, but the Pilot Guilds ignored requests from captains, shipowners, and fishermen to build lighthouses, and it was not built until the end of the century. Another lighthouse. Due to the reluctance of the pilot guilds to build lighthouses, private individuals were given the opportunity to build lighthouses. Between 1610 and 1675, the pilot guilds did not build a single lighthouse, while at least 10 were built privately. Therefore, the construction of lighthouses has become a conflict between two parties. On the one hand, the pilot guild tried to maintain its sole authoritative position in building lighthouses and opposed private construction of lighthouses. On the other hand, the builders of lighthouses built the lighthouse out of personal interests. lighthouse.
In order to avoid infringing on the legal authority of the pilot guilds to build lighthouses, private individuals obtained patent rights from the king. Later, the power to operate lighthouses and collect royalties was granted to individuals by decree of Congress. Lighthouse usage fees are collected by the agent in the port from ships passing the lighthouse. At the same time, in order to maintain their power and make money, the Pilot Guild also applied for the patent right to operate a lighthouse, and then rented it to private individuals who were willing to finance the construction of lighthouses themselves, collecting rents, and the private individuals guaranteed not to cooperate with them. It is conditional on the opposition of the Pilot Association. Through such compromises, privately built lighthouses gained great space and freedom. Coase gave an example to illustrate this situation. In the past, it was considered impossible to build a lighthouse on Eddystone Reef, but in pursuit of maximizing private interests, Henry Winstanley became the first to try it and built the first one in 1699. The lighthouse was washed away by a great storm in 1703, causing great casualties. Although it was so dangerous to build a lighthouse here, it could not prevent the entry of private interests. In 1709, Lovett and Rudyard built another lighthouse, which was destroyed by a fire. Since then, new lighthouses have again been built privately.
Coase pointed out that if we examine the construction of lighthouses in the early nineteenth century, we can understand the important role played by private individuals and private organizations in the construction of British lighthouses. The Lighthouse Committee reported in 1843 that there were 56 lighthouses in England and Wales, 14 of which were operated by private individuals or private organizations. The situation in 1820 was that 24 lighthouses were operated by pilot guilds and 22 by private individuals or private organizations.
Among the 24 lighthouses operated by the Pilot Guild, 12 were taken back to the Pilot Guild when the leases signed with private individuals expired, and one was transferred by the Chester Council in 1816, which means that in 1820, 46 Among the lighthouses, 34 were built by private individuals, and only 46-34=11 were built by pilot associations.
Through this period of history, we found that private individuals were not impossible to provide lighthouses due to the difficulty of charging fees, as economists expected. On the contrary, private individuals played an extremely important role in British lighthouses. D. A. Stevenson wrote: "Before 1806, whenever possible, it leased the right to build lighthouses to lessees..."
Pilot societies purchased privately built lighthouses. In 1822, a small select committee of the British House of Commons made a recommendation that the Pilot Guild purchase a private lighthouse. The reasons are: the management of lighthouses is unreasonable, such as different management agencies, different lighthouse tax rates, different collection principles, etc.; lighthouses are of great importance to the British navy and commerce, and cannot be left alone, but should be managed; taxation on the shipping industry is unreasonable and would lead to a disadvantage in unequal competition with other nations' shipping, and therefore the lighthouse tax should be reduced to either the management of existing lighthouses and floating lighthouses, or the construction and management of new ones necessary for the nation's commerce and shipping. Minimum that lighthouses are suitable for. [9] As a result, pilot guilds began to purchase some private lighthouses, and by 1842, there were no longer privately owned lighthouses in Britain.
Coase questioned this suggestion, particularly the idea that unifying the management of lighthouses would lead to any reduction in lighthouse taxes. Facts have indeed proved that after the loan was paid off in 1848, the lighthouse tax was not reduced. This is contrary to the original intention of this proposal.
Establishment of the Lighthouse Fund: A Commerce Fund was established in 1853, which was provided by the lighthouse tax and a certain amount of other funds. In 1898, the Commercial Marine Fund was abolished and the General Lighthouse Fund was established, which is now the British lighthouse system.
In "Lighthouses in Economics", although Coase did not explicitly state the theory of social continuity, we can still see his methodological presupposition from the evolution of the British lighthouse system. Mill, Sidgwick, Pigou and Samuelson's views on public products are actually at one extreme, that is, lighthouses, as public products, can only be provided by the government and private Unavailable for various reasons. But the British lighthouse system showed that "early history showed that, contrary to the beliefs of many economists, lighthouse services could be provided privately". However, Coase did not jump to the other extreme at this time, that is, overemphasis on the fact that lighthouses can only be provided by private individuals. Instead, he told us that the British lighthouse system was at certain stages through the government, pilot guilds and private individuals. Through negotiation and compromise, *** came together to build and operate the lighthouse. Through Coase's explanation, we can understand this: In fact, there are no pure public goods, and it is impossible for any government or individual to try to monopolize the supply of public goods.