Comment by devsda

13 hours ago

You can't think of a single situation where an airline route is infinitely better and probably the only viable option ?

Btw you don't need to completely disregard other modes of transport to appreciate bus :)

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devsda

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appreciatorBus  11 hours ago

Buses and planes are both great! Both have advantages and disadvantages, and different cost structures. I trust people to make their own decisions about trade-offs for travel that work for them and their situation. When we arbitrarily pick one and shovel free money, land or infrastructure toward it, we are putting a thumb on the scale and depriving people of the power to make their own decisions.

Of course, we can argue that there are network effects or natural monopoly effects for fixed infrastructure like roads and rails, and thus there must be a public role. However policy rarely seems to remain at this reasonable position and instead quickly expands into something altogether different.

  • kelnos  5 hours ago

    > When we arbitrarily pick one

    Aren't all modes of transportation in the US either subsidized or public-owned to some degree? We haven't arbitrarily picked one; we picked them all.

    Air travel is maybe the least subsidized, though? Essential Air Service is probably the main thing? Long-distance bus like Greyhound is only minimally subsidized too.

    But local transit (bus & rail), and regional and long-distance rail are all subsidized or publicly owned in the US. Most roads are publicly-owned, either locally or by the federal government. Long-distance bus and rail are actually unusual in how little they're subsidized.

    • appreciatorBus  1 hour ago

      You forgot that private cars are also creatures of subsidy. We like to think that the main input to go vroom vroom in cars is cheap gasoline, but IMO it’s realy cheap land. (aka subsidized public land)

      A car with no gas could still be used to store stuff, or even roll downhill. A car with no land can’t be used at all for anything. And the amount of land required increases with the square of the velocity you want to travel out. But we never add that in.

      As far as air travel, I haven’t done the math, but I suspect if you were to add up just the foregone property tax revenue associated with the land underneath the airports you’d end up with some pretty serious numbers.

      Anyways, my basic point all of this is the same – we should be careful about subsidies because they tend to distort incentives and decision-making, whether we apply them to airplanes or horse buggies. It doesn’t mean that there’s no place for government involvement in transport, simply that we ought to be wise to the side effects and externalities. I could buy that the government should be involved in air travel, but I part ways with the idea that this should be extended such that if people get used cheap fares on Spirit then the government should guarantee Spirit operation forever. Maybe Spirit was just an anomaly, and we’ll be fine when it’s gone? Some people might fly a little less, some people will just eat the difference and not care, some people will take the bus, some people will buy a car. It’s all just normal people making normal trade-offs about decisions in their life.