Houston residents asked to give input on Texas' $12 billion bullet train (how much, subsidized)

[fnh]

Originally Posted by oceangaia

Big fat difference is that user fare revenues cover all the airlines' operating costs whereas fares typically cover an average 15%-50% of rail operating costs. If you had to pay a fare sufficient to cover costs, you might be more aware of how expensive rail is.

Er, airline fares cover operating costs only after the billions they receive in federal subsidies. Yours is a free market fantasy, like most. Not picking on you personally, but too many people now preach a free market mantra without appreciating that "free market" is an academic construct that has rarely, if ever, existed in real life.

(Thanks Dopo!)

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by fnh

Er, airline fares cover operating costs only after the billions they receive in federal subsidies. Yours is a free market fantasy, like most. Not picking on you personally, but too many people now preach a free market mantra without appreciating that "free market" is an academic construct that has rarely, if ever, existed in real life.

(Thanks Dopo!)

Airlines don't receive subsidies, airports do. That's on the cities not the airlines, and most airports are cash cows for the local municipalities.

Btw, Trump called for ending subsidies to rural airports.
Trump Budget Ends Subsidies for Rural Airports, Promising $175 Million in Savings - Hit & Run : Reason.com

As for "billions", you must mean since time began.
The Business Travel Coalition, which backs retaining Open Skies agreements and is seeking to counter the U.S. carriers’ charges that Emirates, Qatar, and Etihad received $42 billion in unfair government subsidies, uncovered a U.S. congressional report, disclosed by WikiLeaks in 2009, that documents how U.S. aviation, including commercial airlines, the FAA, and airports, received $155 billion in federal direct spending from 1918 to 1998.

Less than $2B per year for the entire aviation industry. We give Amtrak alone $1.5B per year, $70B total so far. And it still loses an average $600 million per year.

You want to add $10 to each airline ticket, fine. I'm all for that. Make the aviation AND the rail industries self supporting from user fees.

[fnh]

10 Ways Taxpayers Subsidize U.S. Airlines - Live and Let's Fly

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by fnh

10 Ways Taxpayers Subsidize U.S. Airlines - Live and Let's Fly

Talking about stretching, grasping desperately, for some way to call it a subsidy. Military pilots? As if the Air Force doesn't have to train military pilots anyway. Why stop there? Why not call the soveriegnty the military provides us a complete subsidy?

[fnh]

It absolutely is, isn't it? Just as much as subsidizing public schools provides a supply of "skilled" labor. Just as much as subsidizing roads/ports/rail etc is essential for commerce. People hugely underestimate the cost of bankruptcies (around 100 airline bankruptcies in recent decades) - not just the restructured/discharged debts which translates into taxpayer subsidies for private benefit, but there is also the underlying massive public cost of the courts and entire legal system in place.

Someone using a gun to steal money is called a criminal; someone exploiting the legal system (looking at you, trump) to steal money is called a "smart businessperson."

[oceangaia]

We can call the stable government in which we do business a "subsidy". We can call the air we breathe and the water we drink a subsidy. It's all an attempt to obfuscate and diminish the meaning of subsidy.

[fnh]

Yes, yes, and no.

[Dopo]

Originally Posted by oceangaia

We can call the stable government in which we do business a "subsidy". We can call the air we breathe and the water we drink a subsidy. It's all an attempt to obfuscate and diminish the meaning of subsidy.

Is this an airline subsidy?


Is Essential Air Service wasting taxpayer money?

A 50-seat commercial jet leaves Denver twice daily for two remote North Dakota towns. When CBS News flew to Devils Lake, North Dakota, last week, a town with a population of 7,200, there were rows of empty seats and only four other passengers.
The Department of Transportation shells out over $6 million a year to fund that route, one of 113 in the lower 48 states servicing rural communities like Devils Lake.
Government data shows that on average last year, 44 of the 113 routes flew at least two thirds empty; among them, flights to Devils Lake.

[oceangaia]

Originally Posted by Dopo

Is this an airline subsidy?


Is Essential Air Service wasting taxpayer money?

A 50-seat commercial jet leaves Denver twice daily for two remote North Dakota towns. When CBS News flew to Devils Lake, North Dakota, last week, a town with a population of 7,200, there were rows of empty seats and only four other passengers.
The Department of Transportation shells out over $6 million a year to fund that route, one of 113 in the lower 48 states servicing rural communities like Devils Lake.
Government data shows that on average last year, 44 of the 113 routes flew at least two thirds empty; among them, flights to Devils Lake.

More accurately, it is a subsidy for North Dakota residents of Devils Lake. Without the subsidy, airlines would not lose money on the route - they would simply not run the route. It's more of a case of the feds subsidizing rural residents, such as maintaining lightly post offices and other government offices in rural areas.

But still, those kinds of subsidies need to go and I already provided the link where Trump was wanting to end them in his proposed budget.

[LocalPlanner]

Originally Posted by oceangaia

Big fat difference is that user fare revenues cover all the airlines' operating costs whereas fares typically cover an average 15%-50% of rail operating costs. If you had to pay a fare sufficient to cover costs, you might be more aware of how expensive rail is.

I'm not talking about fare recovery ratios, which are low for public rail transit (and usually bus as well). I'm talking about just the overall total operating cost, per mile or per train or whatever is appropriate.