As a self-conscious movement with genuine influence at the national level, privatization came later to the USA than to Great Britain or France. As the concept of privatization began to creep into the lexicon of the international intellectual and policy communities, it was frequently exclusively associated with the sale of state-owned industries. The USA – with a cultural heritage of individualism, localism, and entrepreneurialism – had never developed much of an array of state enterprises. Europeans had always regarded the US version of the “welfare state” as puny and under-developed compared to theirs. In the international game of privatization, it seemed that the USA could be only a penny-ante player watching a dollar-ante game.

Beginning in the early 1980s, however, privatization in the USA moved from an intellectual fringe to become a centerpiece in contemporary public policy debates. In part, this meant denning privatization more broadly, to include not only state-owned industries but any other properties in which the government held a major stake, and to include not just outright sales, but any other means of significantly increasing the role of private actors and market forces. The Reagan Administration began to target programs and assets for possible sale early in its first term. In early 1987, the first major privatization was carried out, with the sale of the government's 85 percent interest in Conrail, a corporation established by Congress in 1976 to provide freight rail service in the Northeast. A President's Commission on Privatization, established in September 1987, proposed further efforts to increase private participation across a broad range of policy areas including low-income housing, air traffic control, the postal service, prisons, and schools.