In an effort to avoid politics as much as I can, roads tend to escape scrutiny about government subsidies because they are a baseline, bring-your-own-vehicle requirement, which doesn't smell nearly as 'subsidized' to people who then have to provide their own cars to use them.
In the 'equity' vs 'equality' debate, roads are 'equality': everyone is given the same road to succeed, but of course not everyone has a vehicle to make use of it properly.
But this debate pops up in areas when tolls, euphemistic "usage fees", or increases in fuel taxes are proposed to pay for new roads.
Yes, but the road itself always loses 100% of the money, except for toll roads. It is considered to be an external benefit to the economy that people can move around, even if they have to bring their own vehicles. Therefore it is true in the case of roads that we collectively believe subsidies lead to a better economy. It is not nonsense to extend that belief to railroads.
Perhaps it can be generalized as 'people tend to support only things that are directly and immediately beneficial to their current life circumstances, and demonstrably non-detrimental to their real or perceived future lifestyle prospects'.
100% is an exaggeration, but it's not far off. Our roads aren't just failing from a lack of maintenance, they're failing in one generation, they're failing to be paid for from usage taxes before they need full replacement.
In New York, less than half of the cost of roads is borne by drivers via the gas tax. In California, drivers pay less than a quarter of the cost.
There are no states in the US where gas taxes cover more than 60% of the cost of roads.
This is another form of racism/classism. White people have no problem paying for white people transport (cars!). They object to "city" transport which often carries poor and other-colored people.
If only there was a way to charge for the privilege of driving on the road. Maybe we could stamp out steel plates to affix to vehicles. Those plates could signify that the owner has paid an annual fee for using the road.
As I understand it, cars can be fairly expensive. Maybe some kind of tax on the sale of each one could bring in a few bucks.
Here at HN, your point could
convince a lot of people
if you gave some solid references
to original sources for your
statements about costs and how
they are covered.
I'm in NYS and have been for 20+ years,
and what I've seen in the last time
or two I renewed the license on my
car was that I paid a surtax
to support the commuter trains,
the MTA. So, it looks like
the car owners are supporting
the trains whether they use the
trains or not. Only once did I
ever get on one of those trains.
And I'm proud to say that I've
never been on a NYC subway.
E.g., I live on a nice street in
the suburbs. There is maintenance
on the streets and snow plowing in
the winters. My impression is that
my local town is paying for that
out of real estate taxes -- if so, then that's
fair since everyone in the suburbs
needs the streets, even if they shop
at Amazon and get deliveries
via FedEx or some such.
But passenger
trains? People in the suburbs
don't need passenger trains so much, and
even if they do they still need
the local streets to go
between the trains and the doors.
So, again, using real estate taxes
to pay for the local streets
is fair enough.
I don't have good data on what the
costs are for Federal highways, bridges,
trains, capex, opex, and
how those costs are being
covered,
but my impression is
that the gas taxes and tolls pay
for what the cars and trucks use
and that in the US it's just
hopeless for the train tickets
to pay for what the trains cost --
but again that's just my impression.
Since I'm not in either the car or
train business, I haven't gotten
the data.
But if you are for trains and want
to convince people, then having
the data on costs and how
they are being covered
would help, really, is crucial.
Uh, writing this, it occurs to me
that to be fair the Federal gas taxes
should need to cover only
the Federally supported highways
and bridges, e.g., the Interstate
highways. In that case, sure,
local real estate taxes
and not Federal gas taxes
may be the main source of funding
for local streets.
If you consider that passenger trains remove other people from the road, drivers actually do benefit from their construction. It's not necessary for the train to serve you personally for it to be beneficial. It just has to remove enough people from the road that driving is easier for you.
The comment you're replying to did say "classist" as well. I'm sure you're aware of the US's unequal spread of wealth among different racial groups in its population... You are not personally being called racist.
People in the US are generally completely unaware of how subsidized their drive-everywhere, segregated-zoning lifestyles are. Land use choices have very real effects and in the vast majority of the US, you HAVE to own a car or you are completely handicapped in terms of access to jobs and services.
Public transit infrastructure proposals in the US are routinely downscaled/defeated because a lot of people think that anything other than building roads = money pit subsidies for the dumb uneducated poor people who live in the city.
If you don't agree with the egalitarian side of the argument for making cars less necessary to living in America, you should at least be able to see the hypocrisy of the general attitude towards transit given the fact that gas taxes and other car-related usage fees that fund roads don't come anywhere near making the road network "pay for itself".
I suspect that as Millennials age and gain political power, given their left-leaning politics and greater preference for urban living, this situation will change to look more like Canada does now, which is similarly car-dependent but also generally has cities with more reasonable public transit options.
In the 'equity' vs 'equality' debate, roads are 'equality': everyone is given the same road to succeed, but of course not everyone has a vehicle to make use of it properly.
But this debate pops up in areas when tolls, euphemistic "usage fees", or increases in fuel taxes are proposed to pay for new roads.