On Thursday entrepreneur extraordinaire Elon Musk, chief executive of Tesla, announced that Tesla will be introducing autonomous technology this summer. The technology will allow drivers to place their cars on “auto-pilot” on major roads and highways.

The news of a self-driving car is not exactly a technological breakthrough. Mercedes-Benz, Infiniti, and Honda already have cars on the road that are capable of driving themselves. But the manufactures have safeguards in place, which prevent autonomous driving and require operators to place their hands on the wheel every few seconds or the vehicle will come to a stop. The update needed to enable self-driving in Tesla cars is a software update; the car a mechanically capable of self-driving already.

The only thing holding self-driving cars back are regulations. It is shocking that Musk is comfortable regulations will be in place by this summer that will offer his company legal protection in the event that a Tesla self-driving vehicle gets into an accident.

The New York Times reports:

A spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration responded at the time that “any autonomous vehicle would need to meet applicable federal motor vehicle safety standards.” and that the agency “will have the appropriate policies and regulations in place to ensure the safety of these types of vehicles.” Other automakers are in fast pursuit of similar self-driving features. Cadillac, for instance, said last year that it would make a so-called supercruise feature, allowing hands-free highway driving, available in its 2017 model year cars. But analysts say the industry is banking that new state or federal rules will be in place by that time. “A couple of years is a couple of years; that’s a lot longer than two to three months,” Mr. Brauer said. “Maybe Musk is hoping that by the summer he can get one state like California to sign off — but even that may be a stretch.”

As the above excerpt states, Musk is likely acting strategically and targeting California to pass regulations for self-driving cars, rather than waiting for federal regulations. We have reported before on Elon Musk’s willingness to utilize crony tactics in order to grow his company, So it’s not out of the realm of possibility that he’s using his company’s resources to influence the regulations and to maximize Tesla’s legal protection.

This practice, known as crony-capitalism, is a neologism that describes business transactions or deals that rely upon a close relationship between businesses and government officials. Often, crony capitalism results in larger companies using their vast resources to secure favorable legal permits, grants, tax breaks, regulations, or other forms of government intervention in the marketplace. You can bet your bottom dollar that Tesla will not make the self-driving software available to consumers, to be used on public roadways, until they are adequately protected from potential legal ramifications of a serious or fatal accident caused by one of their self-driving models.

These discussions to draft regulations and laws for self-driving vehicles raise important questions and should be held in the open. Instead they are being held in secret and will likely favor vehicle manufacturers, while neglecting to adequately protect the consumers in the event of an accident.

If more individuals in our society understood and valued property rights, this important discussion would be structured differently. In the current system, most highways and major roads are owned by the “public”, so the regulations and laws are drafted and enforced by government entities.

If roads were privately owned this would allow for the property owner to work directly with Tesla to develop regulations for self-driving vehicles. This would provide an incentive for the property owner and Tesla to draft regulations that are fair to the vehicle owners. Consumers would likely not agree to drive on certain private roadways if they did not feel adequately protected.

A roadway system based on property rights would provide an opportunity for drivers of traditional vehicles to avoid roadways that allow self-driving vehicles if they choose. Operators would have clearly defined rules that they would be forced to accept by agreeing to the term and conditions of using a certain private road. Over time popular roadways with identical or similar regulations could come to agreements to allow uninterrupted travel, which would enable people to travel large distances or to navigate complex city streets without the regulations on a given road changing.

This would be much like the system we have today, but instead of the rules and regulations being enforced by a coercive government, the roadways would be managed by a coalition of property owners forming a consensual government.

As technology continues to advance forward with self-driving cars and maybe someday flying cars, it is going to become easier for consumers to be lost in the shuffle and have their rights trampled my large corporations that are in bed with coercive governments. It is up to those that understand property rights to point out situations where the current system allows or enables rights violations to occur and provide insight into how a world that values rights would handle some of these complex problems.

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