Why the private sector can’t replace U.S. government data

 A very timely discussion about why the private sector cannot collect information in the same way as the government can. This ties nicely into our discussion of perfect markets where information is necessary for the efficient functioning of markets. Private firms can and do provide some statistics, but the article argues that many area are neglected by the private market. One can classify this as an example of positive externality where a social benefit of information is greater than the private benefit to a firm generating the information. Hence, we would expect that information would be undersupplied and overpriced compared to a situation where firms could capture the externality. Perhaps that is a justification for the government to provide information.