Once upon a time there was a small government agency known as the Federal Communications Commission that behaved, well, like a government agency. Regulators of the airwaves since the explosion of radio and television in the 30's and 40's, the FCC did what regulators did in those days. They issued licenses, carried out inspections, and generally policed the business of broadcasting. Private fortunes were being made in the then-new electronic media business, and the FCC was the traffic cop keeping everything in order.

That was then. The FCC of 2002 doesn't act much like a government agency anymore, and among Washington bureaucracies, it's not alone. These days, the FCC isn't just a traffic cop on the information highway of modern telecommunications. It's more like a landlord, reaping rents and royalties large enough to sustain a small country. In fact, the agency is so focused on the hundreds of billions of dollars it raises from auctioning off the public airwaves that its old bailiwick, television and radio, is practically on its own when it comes to regulation.

There has been a general awakening in the halls of government to the benefits of making a profit. Increasingly, if you want something from the government, particularly if you are a business, you may find yourself paying a princely sum. Users of Census data, access to public records of all kinds, land users, and those who use the radio spectrum pay a price that bears a closer relationship to what they are willing to pay, rather than what it costs to provide.

On its face, it sounds like sound policy. The fact that businesses do pony up and pay for what the government has to sell is testimony to its unique value. In the increasingly sophisticated world of marketing and communication, the detailed demographic, statistical, and regulatory resources of governments are essential for many private business's daily activities.

And it's not exactly a new practice. One of the biggest revenue sources of the fledgling Federal government of 1790 was the license fees and duties collected from ferries that operated in New York harbor. Besides, aren't revenues from sales and leases, which are willingly handed over by the businesses who want them, to be preferred over tax increases, which are mandated by law?

Before we applaud our bureaucrats for their business acumen, however, we should notice that there's something missing in this picture. That's competition from other sellers. When you're buying the government's product, chances are there are no close substitutes. Backed by the power of the law, public participation in activities like first class mail delivery and the decennial Census is far beyond what a private firm could obtain.

Even when it is not illegal, private competition with an enterprise like the Bureau of the Census is wholly impractical. With its flagship decennial tabulation paid for with $6.8 billion of tax dollars, the Bureau is hardly on an equal footing with private, tax-paying survey firms that have to pay for their own overhead, let alone collect their own data.

We should recognize government agencies who exploit the value of their resources in the private sector for what they are -- monopolists. Even thought the profits they extract do go into the public purse, the power to exploit their uniqueness as a source of vital information and services should not be allowed to go unchecked.