The National Parks System has long been dubbed “America’s Best Idea.” Many other societies around the world—free and otherwise—have gone much further with the idea that the public sector can and should provide goods to the public, from Britain’s National Health Service to Mexico’s state oil company Pemex to China’s high-speed rail system. Still, it is in the majesty of the Yosemite Valley or the depths of the Grand Canyon that the American vision of a strong public sector most clearly and physically manifested. No wonder Elon Musk hates it.
Ever since Musk launched his Department of Government Efficiency, he and his team have had the National Parks in their crosshairs. Recently, he falsely claimed the National Park Service had wasted $1 billion on a survey. Before that, he fired 1,000 employees of the system as well as 3,000 US Forest Service workers, which has already led to partial closures and limitations on access to some sites. The National Parks System seems like a poorly chosen target, as it is a popular institution and a net positive generator of federal income. Its budget is under $4 billion a year, but it generates more than $50 billion in economic activity a year. This assault has nothing to do with efficiency, and everything to do with the administration’s broader plan to “reprivatize the economy.”