I see your point and it can be true, in particular when the state is officially controlled by a single party, and/or in societies with systematic corruption. A

I see your point and it can be true, in particular when the state is officially controlled by a single party, and/or in societies with systematic corruption. And while your examples are also true, I would argue that it's actually normal for rail and post to be in the red. This is because their primary purpose is not to generate revenue for the state, but to provide a service to taxpayers. For example, unprofitable train routes have to be kept because they link remote areas to cities. In fact, when private industry handles these type of public services, users tend to have poorer service and higher costs, because there is a natural monopoly. For train service, take a look at the UK, where different companies "compete": service is worse than France at a higher cost. La Poste has been a publicly traded company for about 10 years if memory serves. Service has been getting worse ever since.