You think its bad for PAT now, it's about to get A LOT WORSE! (Pittsburgh: public school, electric)

[Goinback2011]

I don't hate it. If government offers something worthwhile at a reasonable price, I'd use it. I just don't want to subsidize parasites anymore. I don't want to pay YOUR way plus mine.

You want it, you pay for it.

It's coming. You just can't see it yet.

[squarian]

I think we can all see it. And smell it.

[ferraris]

Originally Posted by Goinback2011

I don't hate it. If government offers something worthwhile at a reasonable price, I'd use it. I just don't want to subsidize parasites anymore. I don't want to pay YOUR way plus mine.

You want it, you pay for it.

It's coming. You just can't see it yet.

Are you in favor of ending the subsidization of public roads, especially in rural areas? As I pointed out before, those are even more "parasitic" than transit.

[greg42]

Originally Posted by ferrarisnowday

Are you in favor of ending the subsidization of public roads, especially in rural areas? As I pointed out before, those are even more "parasitic" than transit.

Sounds like a good idea.

Actually, Goinback is a big rider of the parasitic transit.

[UKyank]

Originally Posted by Goinback2011

The beauty of something like transit is, the transit riders pay for the services. Statists want non-riders to pay via state-funding.

It is very rare for a transit system that covers a wide area to exist without some state subsidies else the cost to any individual user would be so high no one could afford to use the system. To across the board dismiss transit systems as a statist's wet dream is misguided.

[BrianTH]

Trying to pay for every government good or service through user fees would end up wasting a large amount of resources just in collection. And it would lead to the inefficient underprovision of government goods and services due to the fact that often many of the benefits take the form of positive externalities. And these problems would be particularly acute with capital investments (things like education, infrastructure, and so on), where many of the benefits will accrue only in the future.

So that's a really terrible idea.

[Goinback2011]

It's a 'terrible idea' to those who consume government services, I'm sure, but not to those of us who would like a choice of being a consumer and a payer for this stuff.

Public transit is something that definitely should be paid for by users of public transit. Road taxes are paid for in a variety of ways, as I understand it, including license fees and gas taxes. Gas taxes and the like should not be used to pay transit company pensions.

The feds also throw a lot of pork at the states with transportation money. I'd personally rather the taxes were at the state and local level for this than at the federal level.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Goinback2011

It's a 'terrible idea' to those who consume government services, I'm sure, but not to those of us who would like a choice of being a consumer and a payer for this stuff.

You're the direct or indirect beneficiary of thousands of government programs every day. Do you really want to be spending your whole day trying to make micropayments for all that?

Public transit is something that definitely should be paid for by users of public transit.

Public transit creates large positive externalities, meaning benefits that accrue to non-riders. If you try to finance public transit entirely out of fares, you will end up providing far less than the optimal service levels, thereby losing the opportunity to get a large portion of these positive externalities.

Road taxes are paid for in a variety of ways, as I understand it, including license fees and gas taxes.

Of course those aren't user fees either. They don't directly track individual road usage, and the funds are reallocated between different users, and not returned in a remotely proportionate way. Moreover, in Pennsylvania fuel is exempt from sales taxes, which is economically equivalent to a funding transfer from the general account. Finally, road users are one of the chief third-party beneficiaries of transit.

Given this system, there is really nothing untoward about Allegheny County getting a portion of the transportation taxes and fees it pays to the state in the form of transit funding. Of course what would be ideal for Allegheny County is getting complete control of those revenues, including the ability to replace them with alternatives, instead of having the state take so much of them for spending elsewhere.

The feds also throw a lot of pork at the states with transportation money. I'd personally rather the taxes were at the state and local level for this than at the federal level.

It certainly would be better for Allegheny County if it were all devolved down to that level. Of course all the representatives of the rural areas who get federal and state wealth transfers from large urban areas via the status quo system will fight like heck to prevent that from happening.

[Goinback2011]

You're the direct or indirect beneficiary of thousands of government programs every day.

Wrong. When cost shifting happens, I'm the person they're shifted too, in every instance. I'm sick of it. I want the freeloaders to pay their own way.

If you try to finance public transit entirely out of fares, you will end up providing far less than the optimal service levels, thereby losing the opportunity to get a large portion of these positive externalities.

You're not even getting the freeloaders to pay fares anymore. I've personally witnessed people getting on the bus with no money and no pass and asking the driver 'hey man, can I ride?'. The driver waves them onto the bus. Costs successfully shifted for that guy. The only other 'positive externality' of cost shifting is less traffic going downtown. If a transit route can't support itself via fares then there isn't that much traffic saved. Period.

Why are you so anti-road? Do you not have a car? Or what?

[Anonymous939630]

Originally Posted by Goinback2011

Why are you so anti-road? Do you not have a car? Or what?

The much better question is: Why are you so anti-transit? Do you not care about our regional economy or what?