Pundit: Our city made a mistake when it sold a private company the rights to assess and collect parking fees. The private company raised parking fees and so has been able to reap profits far greater than what it paid for the rights to assess and collect the fees. If the city had not sold the rights, then that money would have gone to the city. The pundit's argument requires the assumption that ['the city could have raised parking fees had it not sold the rights', 'municipal functions like assessing and collecting parking fees should always be handled directly by the municipality in question', 'other private companies would have been willing to pay for the rights to assess and collect parking fees', 'private companies assess and collect parking fees more efficiently than cities do']