4 ms·

Mass transit is meant to be a public service, not a source of profit.

dustintrex 5y ago
The tax base in the Japanese countryside is rapidly collapsing and the public money used to prop up railways at the end of the day comes out of the same pot of taxpayer money that's used to fund schools, hospitals, etc. Personally, I'm a huge railfan, but it's still absurd to spend $3m/year to serve commuters that would easily fit in a single minibus.
- TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
  I assume the Japanese have heard of MMT?
  - kwhitefoot 5y ago
    The Japanese might have done but I hadn't so i looked it up. Here is a summary in case anyone else was in my position: " Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is a heterodox macroeconomic framework that says monetarily sovereign countries like the U.S., U.K., Japan, and Canada, which spend, tax, and borrow in a fiat currency that they fully control, are not operationally constrained by revenues when it comes to federal government spending. Put simply, such governments do not rely on taxes or borrowing for spending since they can print as much as they need and are the monopoly issuers of the currency. Since their budgets aren’t like a regular household’s, their policies should not be shaped by fears of rising national debt. MMT challenges conventional beliefs about how the government interacts with the economy, the nature of money, the use of taxes, and the significance of budget deficits. These beliefs, critics say, are a hangover from the gold standard era and are no longer accurate, useful, or necessary. MMT is used in policy debates to argue for such progressive legislation as universal healthcare and other public programs for which governments claim to not have enough money to fund. " By Deborah D'Souza, https://www.investopedia.com/modern-monetary-theory-mmt-4588060 https://www.investopedia.com/modern-monetary-theory-mmt-4588...
- ant6n 5y ago
  46ppl/km/day on a 38km line do not fit on a single minibus.
refurb 5y ago
Money doesn’t grow on trees. At $30M/year you could run a daily bus for $1M and spend the $29M on healthcare (for example).
- speed_spread 5y ago
  Seeing the recent advances in biotech, we might not be that far off from money growing on trees.
ovi256 5y ago
Surely you agree that public service should deliver good service to as many people as possible ? Burning resources on a service from which very few benefit (that's what low ridership means) is not conducive to that. Those resources should be deployed elsewhere.
- thrashh 5y ago
  It’s easy for this example but usually the line is way more blurry Currently richer areas already subsidize plenty of things like roads, airplane routes and many other services. It’s figuring out below what number of users it is when it is no longer appropriate
renewiltord 5y ago
Yeah, but mass transit is also meant to be mass transit.

The tax base in the Japanese countryside is rapidly collapsing and the public money used to prop up railways at the end of the day comes out of the same pot of taxpayer money that's used to fund schools, hospitals, etc. Personally, I'm a huge railfan, but it's still absurd to spend $3m/year to serve commuters that would easily fit in a single minibus.

TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
I assume the Japanese have heard of MMT?
- kwhitefoot 5y ago
  The Japanese might have done but I hadn't so i looked it up. Here is a summary in case anyone else was in my position: " Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is a heterodox macroeconomic framework that says monetarily sovereign countries like the U.S., U.K., Japan, and Canada, which spend, tax, and borrow in a fiat currency that they fully control, are not operationally constrained by revenues when it comes to federal government spending. Put simply, such governments do not rely on taxes or borrowing for spending since they can print as much as they need and are the monopoly issuers of the currency. Since their budgets aren’t like a regular household’s, their policies should not be shaped by fears of rising national debt. MMT challenges conventional beliefs about how the government interacts with the economy, the nature of money, the use of taxes, and the significance of budget deficits. These beliefs, critics say, are a hangover from the gold standard era and are no longer accurate, useful, or necessary. MMT is used in policy debates to argue for such progressive legislation as universal healthcare and other public programs for which governments claim to not have enough money to fund. " By Deborah D'Souza, https://www.investopedia.com/modern-monetary-theory-mmt-4588060 https://www.investopedia.com/modern-monetary-theory-mmt-4588...
ant6n 5y ago
46ppl/km/day on a 38km line do not fit on a single minibus.

refurb 5y ago

Money doesn’t grow on trees. At $30M/year you could run a daily bus for $1M and spend the $29M on healthcare (for example).

speed_spread 5y ago
Seeing the recent advances in biotech, we might not be that far off from money growing on trees.

ovi256 5y ago

Surely you agree that public service should deliver good service to as many people as possible ? Burning resources on a service from which very few benefit (that's what low ridership means) is not conducive to that. Those resources should be deployed elsewhere.

thrashh 5y ago
It’s easy for this example but usually the line is way more blurry Currently richer areas already subsidize plenty of things like roads, airplane routes and many other services. It’s figuring out below what number of users it is when it is no longer appropriate

renewiltord 5y ago

Yeah, but mass transit is also meant to be mass transit.