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Joe Mysak Advocates Massive Expansion of Socialis….mmm….Public Transportation

Dying for Expansion

Joe Mysak wrote an editorial today that provided some of the most blunt and honest criticisms of public transportation that I have ever seen in print. Unfortunately, he followed it up with a shameless plea for the rapid expansion of public transit with, or without, the consent of the voters.

There are several problems with Mr. Mysak’s argument, but let me touch on the most basic. The expansion of public transit will not address any of the reasons that Mr. Mysak pointed out for why people don’t use it. Expanding the systems will not necessarily make it any closer to my house, or make it any more on time, or any more affordable than driving. If current performance is indicative, it will simply result in a much bigger opportunity for the sloths in their taxpayer funded cubicles to throw money down a drain.

Using math from a previous post I did on this subject, gas would have to cost $16.50 per gallon before my cost to drive to work would exceed the cost of riding the Metro. Let’s say I lived farther away, in Vienna for instance. Then a round trip by Metro would cost $4.70. The distance would be 16.2 miles, and at 27 mpg, $4 for a gallon of gas would still be cheaper than Metro.  If I live farther away, I have to drive anyway because Vienna’s as far as Metro extends.  If they extend the system, that’s a huge cost, and the fare will simply be higher from farther out.

Clearly if the cost of oil continues to rise, the price of driving will eventually surpass the cost of Metro for most people, but that’s where Mr. Mysak’s neglected arguments come back into play. How much more am I willing to pay for the convenience of driving?

You might be surprised.

Not all working class people can simply afford to eat the cost of gas, but there are other costs to mass transit that we haven’t added in yet. What if I need to take more trips during the day? What if I have to drive ten miles to get to the nearest metro station? What if I don’t have to sit in traffic on my commute route and so I don’t burn a lot of gas idling in traffic? Add those in, and the costs of mass transit get much bigger as you have to take more trips or spend more time sitting on Metro or in the station.

Arlington County will give Metro $51.1 million this year and has a labor force of roughly 128,000 people. That means that each taxpayer’s share of this money comes to $400 before we even consider any of Mr. Mysak’s expansions. Corporate taxes don’t lower that cost either. Those corporate taxes aren’t cutting into the company’s bottom line. The company is just raising its prices to pass that cost on to you. You will pay that $51.1 million as a taxpayer in Arlington, and this cost, as well as the cost of any proposed expansion, needs to be added on top of the costs of your fares. And remember, the more we expand the system, the more expensive it will be to maintain, run, and staff - and the more our fares will increase to keep pace. All of this mass transit also runs on fuel, so as fuel costs increase, the fares will increase further.

This isn’t necessarily a bargain for anyone.

But what really rubs me the wrong way about this piece is the cavalier attitude toward disregarding the will of the people. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone more gleefully embrace socialism.

That’s why public transportation is too important to be left to the public. It takes a long time, and millions of dollars, to establish, and relies upon subsidies to run. It’s a long-term commitment, and it has to be financed regardless of the fickle nature of the public, and fuel prices.

The public seems to be receptive to this idea right now, but we need something bigger. We need regional, county, perhaps even state dedication to the notion that public transportation is now something that has to be provided and paid for in more than a patchwork fashion.

I know that people don’t always know what’s good for them. But this is a democracy, not a dictatorship. We’re not fighting World War Three. We’re not rationing household goods. This isn’t the kind of cause that requires the collective sacrifice that Mr. Mysak is talking about. As he points out, $9 gas will probably drive more users to Metro, and people will call for its expansion voluntarily. We shouldn’t be trying to dupe a “fickle public” before they can figure it out, and if mass transit is so important, then our leaders should be out stumping for it to prove their point. If FDR had to have fireside chats to convince us to keep fighting WWII, then I don’t think it’s too much to ask of politicians today to convince me to support mass transit expansion before attempting it by fiat.

You can say what you want about how important this problem is. For the record, I know it is important, and I ride mass transit nearly every day and wish it would be expanded. But I am not in favor of expansion at the expense of our constitutional right to say “not with my money” at the ballot box. Allowing such a reckless expansion of fiscal flippancy will only result in the worst kind of fraud, waste, and abuse.

We already have large state agencies that are “dedicated to the notion that public transportation needs to be provided for” – they’re the ones who have let our systems degenerate into the miserable messes that they are. We don’t need any more of them, and we don’t need a massive, forced expansion of mass transit systems that will be abandoned – but still wildly expensive - once hydrogen or electric cars come online and the price of gas becomes irrelevant.

Let the people have their fickle say – market forces will determine what they ask for, and if they aren’t asking for mass transit, don’t build more of it without their approval.