Who Really Owns Their TV?

Many European countries have TV licencing laws.

Here in Ireland, the price of owning a colour television set is €160 per annum. This money is then used by the government to fund the great television programmes that probably would not survive without the warm woolen blanket of government.

But that's not the point I'm trying to make here. My point is about ownership.

In econospeak, ownership is defined as full control of the resource in question. Ownership means not having to pay anybody for the privilige of using a resource. This is contrasted with renting, where a fee is charged periodically for the use of the resource. Failure to pay rent may result in fines or imprisonment.

By this metric, economically speaking, nobody in Ireland, Britain, France and many other European countries owns a television. We perpetually rent them from our governments.