Mark Hemingway’s Preposterous High-Speed Rail Spin
To review what we know about high-speed rail in the stimulus, a last-minute change to the legislation ensured that $8 billion will be appropriated to be spent on high-speed rail projects. Numerous conservative commentators and several Republican legislators have been characterizing this provision as expending $8 billion on a project to build an HSR link between Los Angeles and Las Vegas and darkly hinting that it’s some kind of pork barrel scheme for Harry Reid. That is a wildly inaccurate characterization of the provision which will fund HSR projects nationwide on a competitive basis. So I’ve been complaining about the people who are lying about this. Now along comes Mark Hemingway at the Corner who appears to agree that Reps. Miller and Boehner are completely mischaracterizing the stimulus bill’s HSR provisions, but nonetheless thinks I’m wrong to call them liars because the Vegas-LA route will potentially be eligible for some portion of that $8 billion.
I say: Hemingway is being ridiculous. I’m complaining about people making false statements about HSR in the stimulus. He agrees that they’re statements are false, but somehow I’m to blame? Members of congress wouldn’t get heated denunciations on blogs for making things up if they didn’t make so much stuff up.
UPDATE: Here, for example, is Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI) in a February 17 Detroit News op-ed:
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid stashed a “necessary” high speed rail project in the bill. But how does this $8 billion “Sin Express” from Los Angeles to Las Vegas put someone like Greg from Milford back to work?
McCotter is denouncing a non-existent provision in the bill. He’s lying. If Hemingway has a problem with Republican members of congress being called liars, he needs to get in touch with the McCotters of the world and get them to (a) stop saying this stuff, and (b) demonstrate some good faith by apologizing and correcting the record.
57 Responses to “Mark Hemingway’s Preposterous High-Speed Rail Spin”
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February 18th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Given all the nonsense you’ve written about HSR you’re hardly in a position to complain.
February 18th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
Or perhaps he is saying that there can be a difference between “making false statements” and “lying.” He goes on at some length making that case in the post, laying some of the blame on the fact that it’s a 1,000 page bill that people didn’t have time to read.
Right or wrong about that, there does appear to be a distinction between “being wrong and “making stuff up.” And perhaps when charging someone with lying, you might need to work to make that distinction clear.
For the record, I am extremely open to the possibility that they were lying. In fact, I suspect they were. But it’s certainly not obvious.
Of course, people who simply misstate facts usually go out of their way to correct the record. And I don’t see a lot of that happening. But I haven’t looked.
February 18th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
Shorter Mark Hemmingway, Republican ethicist: When “circumstances seem ripe for breeding misunderstanding and misinformation,” it’s OK to lie to further your own political interests.
February 18th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
By the way, a while back didn’t MY say that proponents of HSR should feel obliged to offer inflated ridership and revenue number when pitching a project? That is, didn’t he suggest they should LIE about those things? I think the idea was that everyone knows you are lying, buy you need to level the rhetorical playing field.
If that’s OK for rail proponents, why not opponents, too?
February 18th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
Wasn’t the 8 billion added in a voice vote earlier in the process and simply “not stripped” at the end? What is all this talk of it being inserted in in private negotiations?
February 18th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
I seem to recall Reid mentioning that a “chunk” of the HSR funding would go to the Vegas-Los Angeles line. I think that is what conservatives are harping on. Obviously they are exaggerating but not necessarily without basis. That said, it seems like a sensible place to have HSR, if not necessarily a route that should be prioritized.
February 18th, 2009 at 6:11 pm
He goes on at some length making that case in the post, laying some of the blame on the fact that it’s a 1,000 page bill that people didn’t have time to read.
If you haven’t read the bill, don’t go around making factual statements about what’s in it! ‘I wasn’t lying — I was just making stuff up because I hadn’t read it’ is not an excuse! Except apparently for Hemingway it is.
February 18th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
How would a theoretical Vegas train line benefit someone in Michigan? Does this tool think the train cars are going to be built in the MGM Grand? Does he think the steel is going to be cast in the Venetian?
You’d think Michigan would have the right kinds of facilities for producing the equipment. I don’t think they *do* have any such businesses at the moment. But they could.
February 18th, 2009 at 7:37 pm
Well…. NBC is broadcasting that part of the $8B for HSR will be going to Harry’s “Pet Project”. A mag lev train from Las Vegas to Disney Land.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/#29245227
They don’t seem to understand the difference between making things up and the truth.
February 18th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
Now the story has cropped up on NBC nightly news:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032619/#29245227
February 18th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
It gets better. When the story broke, I saw a map which supposedly showed the currently proposed HSR lines. Guess what, folks? There is no line on the map showing a link between LA & LV. IOW, it doesn’t even exist in the planning stages. Maybe that’s because there is almost no possibility of such a line being built since there is a very rugged mountain range blocking the way.
But why let facts & reason get in the way of political posturing & obstruction? And if you pass along a lie someone else tells you, you are still lying.
But here is the sickening part. Everyone – every single person – I have talked with about this believe the story is true because they saw it all over the TV. Now tell me again about the so-called liberal media.
February 18th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
Quick question: Matt, once the mag-lev is built, in part using the funds from the stimulus plan, will you admit that it exists?
February 18th, 2009 at 10:50 pm
DTM
When Matt wrote this on October 27, 2008, was he lying or bullshitting:
“On the idea that ridership estimates are unrealistically optimistic, it seems to me that the sad reality of politics is that it would be irresponsible for advocates of any large-scale infrastructure project to do anything other than present unrealistically optimistic measures. For better or for worse, that’s politics.”
So to be clear, when a progressive lies about ridership numbers, that’s “politics.” When someone on the other side of the aisle either lies or makes a mistake or exaggerates, that’s something else.
Weird.
February 18th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
Sam, that’s not lying, nor is it bullshitting. It’s “giving wildly optimistic estimates”. Note the word estimate there, which means it’s not a fact, it’s a guess, probably based on a range. If I estimate the ridership of a potential train line, say from LA to LV, I will crunch the numbers and end up with a range, say from 50 to 100. So I make those data public, and opponents of the line will claim ridership will be 50, while proponents will claim it’ll be 100. Neither one is lying, they’re just giving wildly optomistic/pessimistic estimates.
A store isn’t lying when you see a sale offering “up to 50% off”, but the item you want is only 25% off. It’s just listing a range.
So next time, please try to come up with a more realistic example.
February 18th, 2009 at 11:39 pm
Jeremy,
By this measure, why wouldn’t we then just call the story of the $8 billion Vegas HSR “wildly pessimistic” regarding the cost?
The project exists. If rail proponents can say a certain route will carry X passengers when they know it isn’t true, why can’t the same practice of “politics” include estimating that the Vegas project will eat up all $8 billion of that funding stream?
If you follow large-scale transit projects at all, you would know that the outer-range estimates are the very definition of bullshit. And that they are meant for the very purpose MY identifies in that post: ginning up support.
Just like the GOP is doing right now in the opposite direction: Spinning the numbers to make the project look really bad.
If it’s lying when one side does it, it’s lying when the other side does it.
February 18th, 2009 at 11:47 pm
Jeremy,
But since you mentioned it, why don’t you take, say, two minutes and actually track back through all the links. The quote from Matt in praise of overestimating ridership came in response to a post from Kevin Drum about a HSR project in California.
In his piece, Drum, a long-time and vocal supporter of HSR, called estimates of the train’s travel time a “fantasy.” He called the ridership estimates “fantasy squared.”
In other words, bullshit.
In response, MY did not counter that the estimates were reasonable, or even something like “Fantasy times two.” No, he accepted “fantasy squared” as the reality of the situation… and SUPPORTED PEOPLE who were offering those fantastical, bullshit numbers.
He thinks it’s OK to use ridership estimates that everybody knows are false in order to gin up suport for rail projects.
That is, he thinks it’s OK to misrepresent the facts. To… lie.
February 18th, 2009 at 11:53 pm
Here’s the link to Drum’s article.
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2008/10/more-prop-1a
Fantasy squared.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:17 am
DTM,
He’s making the point that MATT IS A FLAMING HYPOCRITE. I’m not sure what part of that isn’t clear to you.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:20 am
DTM has a mental age of two.
Note that I’m being unrealistically optimistic in estimating the true extent of DTM’s infantilism, but it would be irresponsible of me not to.
February 19th, 2009 at 2:48 am
Oh, jonas, you’re fooling nobody.
February 19th, 2009 at 5:34 am
I read the Kevin Drum article, and I agree with Kevin.
HSR as defined by the California bullet train proposition will never happen, I doubt we will even bother to test a bond issue, since the interest alone will likely bankrupt state government here.
The whole multiplier for money spent on HSR in California, IMHO, is about .2; we might get far enough to generate some vu-grafs, but having watched this crap about bullet trains for so long I think my estimate of .2 might be close to the truth.
Bullet trains are an 1880 technology, rejected in the great depression and constinually rejected except in very specific locations.
February 19th, 2009 at 6:51 am
DTM.
Fair question. Generally, I would prefer for people to be more honest across the board. I have done a bit of writing about ridership numbers, and I think they are usually a sham. I wish they would not be. Relatedly, I think all the GOP legislators involved in this HSR tiff should retract.
At the same time, I am not naive. I realize that “politics” happens. But it seems to me that MY has nearly spun out of control with his tired “Republicans are lying liars” thing. It started last fall when he complained that nobody was pointing out McCain’s fabrications. Except the media was awash in such mentions. But he still complained that this was not sufficient, as it had not yet amounted to a “narrative” of Republicans as liars.
So now, I suppose in pursuit of that end, we get a constant tirade of lying liars. George Will. David Boaz. People talking about trains. Liars liars liars liars liars. All of them lying lying lying. Like conservatives have the market cornered on that. It’s extremely obtuse and childish. Worse, constantly playing that card lessens the effect that it has when someone is actually caught in a huge whopper.
What’s shocking here is that rather than building his “Republicans are liars” narrative, MY’s actions argue for the “they all do it” claim. He slams the GOP for lying about HSR on the same blog on which he actively encouraged people to… lie about HSR. Seriously.
What a lying liar. Liar liar liar. Liar. LIAR.
See. If you keep saying it, it becomes a narrative.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:09 am
First, if it was truly competitive, then companies would be jumping to build it on their own. New airlines keep popping ip – it’s clear that some people see opportunity there. Why is it that no one sees any opportunity in rail? Could it be:
– the huge up front cost required before any money comes in?
– the uncertainty involved in acquiring rights of way, given environmental fights, NIMBY fights (etc, etc)?
– the fact that once built, there’s simply no way for HSR to be cost competitive with car or air travel absent huge, ongoing subsidies?
Or all of the above, maybe? Face it, Matt – the day for rail in the US came and went. I like trains, and I use Amtrak here in the DC NY corridor. But if that rail link didn’t already exist, it wouldn’t make sense to build it on cost grounds.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:48 am
The airlines pay part of the infrastructure cost through passenger taxes that go straight to the customer; examine your next ticket. However, rail has even higher costs. Not only do you need the stations (airports) and controllers, you need all of the track (which needs ongoing maintenance). All you need to do is look at the cost for taking the Acela from DC to NY. I take that when I travel on a corporate dime, but – on my own nickel, I either fly or drive. Why? Because either one is way, way cheaper.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:49 am
Nor do I have any problem with someone “pointing out” that a politician is lying about something. But what we have here is something other than a public information campaign. We have someone actively trying to construct a narrative that one side of the political aisle is less honest than the other. I dispute that notion, but that’s neither here nor there.
What seems tedious here is that the messenger trying to construct that narrative is using the issue of HSR to further his point about what a bunch of lying scumbags Republicans are, despite the fact that he has used the same space to actively encourage people who agree with him to… lie about HSR.
Come on. Seriously. I am all for cool-headed rationality and great parenting. But if Britney Spears had a blog taking someone else to task for not being a great cool-headed parent, wouldn’t her own violations of those ideals make the entire enterprise ridiculous? Particularly if, rather than admitting her own failings, she actively encouraged half the population to be hot-headed bad parents?
What if Bill O’Reilly had a blog dedicated criticizing talk show hosts for shouting? That would be preposterous, right?
That’s what MY is doing here. Ever the ethical commentator, he thumps his chest at the slightest whiff of dishonesty–or even inaccuracy–in GOP statements. While actively encouraging his own side to lie about the same issue.
Sir… your pants. They appear to be on fire. Perhaps that telephone wire had something to do with it. Just a theory.
Someone is indeed being preposterous and ridiculous here. But it’s not Mark Hemingway.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:51 am
McCotter is my rep. and I tried to get him unelected last time and failed. I am sorry about him, I will try again but I need help. Somebody called him a tool…that works,he is a lot of things most are bad names that I won’t use.sorry sorry sorry
February 19th, 2009 at 8:57 am
Who said anything about ignoring them? I said before that I think the people who said the stuff about the HSR ought to retract or clarify or apologize or all of the above.
But there is a larger point here. MY is attempting to position himself as the “reality-based” alternative to all the lying liars. Who, conveniently, are people who disagree with his positions.
There is an ongoing conversation, at least in some circles, as to whether people on his side of the aisle are more honest, more empirical, etc. He claims, emphatically, that they are. That’s quite a claim. People making it would obviously want to take special care to, you know, be honest. To base their arguments in… reality.
How does that play out here? We have MY insisting that people should be “unrealistically optimistic” regarding measures he supports.
Unrealistically optimistic. That is, so optimistic that it flies in the face of reality.
So much for being reality-based.
I understand that you have no problem with that. But it needs to be said nonetheless. Someone is attempting to build a larger narrative about honesty and reality. And that larger narrative happens to be… a lie.
February 19th, 2009 at 9:05 am
DTM, I use Acela as an example because the rail lines already exist, and it’s the closest thing to HSR we have in the US. Any new system will have higher costs, because – like a new toll bridge – it’ll have to be paid down.
As to cost: I’m not sure what kind of airfare you’re looking at. DCA NYC, roundtrip in 2 days is $197 with taxes. Using BWI instead drops that to $178. So heck – flying with no advanced notice to speak of is cheaper than heavily subsidized Amtrak on their flagship route.
I have no idea why you think new HSR will be cost competitive with air travel. If you want to argue on other grounds, fine. On cost grounds? It’s not going to work.
February 19th, 2009 at 9:38 am
There is also the matter of the venue of the lying. Matt advocated using unrealistic estimates of ridership to garner funding. While I think it would be wrong to do so, not doing so represents unilateral disarmament. Nearly all proposals to get federal funding use unrealistic estimates. Those that don’t, probably failed to be unrealistic due to some error. In response, those deciding funding assume all estimates are unreasonably optimistic. So, while Kant would certainly say that HSR advocates should be rigorously honest in their estimations of ridership, such a course would in fact lead to underestimation of ridership by those who make funding decisions.
On the other hand, not every Congressman offers insulting lies about their colleagues. The audience of the statements do not assume they are false. While people may be skeptical of politicians in general, they tend to believe them when they make statements of fact that are objectively verifiable. This is borne out by the way that news organizations uncritically repeated the false statement as true, even though they could easily have determined them to be false. In such circumstances, it is of more importance to set the record straight.
February 19th, 2009 at 9:50 am
“I don’t see him making some broader claim about who does more or less of this.”
Then you aren’t looking very closely. He has written constantly about the dishonesty of the Bush administration. Which is fine. Important, even. I applaud that impulse. At the same time, he has posited a virtuous counter-force to the Evil Empire of Lies, which has become known as the “reality-based community.” See here:
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?articleId=8789
An early MY venue was called, er… “A Reality-Based Weblog.” see here:
http://yglesias.typepad.com
Get it? The other side is based on lies. MY’s side is based in reality.
Then last fall, the constant clamoring for the “McCain is a liar” narrative.
Again, all of this is fine. But it kind of falls apart when the Reality-Based community abandons reality as soon as “unrealistic optimism” is more politicially expedient. So you think the railroad will carry 100,000 people every day? Who cares? Say it will carry a million.
To be an effective counter-force to politicians who lie.. it helps to not lie.
February 19th, 2009 at 10:19 am
“That just has nothing in particular to do with the original topic at hand”
The “original topic at hand” was Republicans lying about high speed rail projects. Which MY says is a terrible thing to do.
The prior post shows MY encouraging people to lie about high speed rail projects.
And these things are somehow unrelated?
According to MY’s update on the post, there is a remedy to lying about HSR: “(a) stop saying this stuff, and (b) demonstrate some good faith by apologizing and correcting the record.”
So I eagerly await MY’s post encouraging HSR supporters to stop offering unrealistically optimistic ridership numbers, and then apologizing and correcting the record by offering reality-based ridership estimates for all the rail projects he has supported in the past. One has to assume he lied about them, of course, because he said that to do otherwise would be irresponsible.
Do you think that is forthcoming? If not, he should probably not counsel others to take that course of action. Unless he is once again abandoning reality in favor of political expediency.
Again, I am at a loss to understand how anyone cannot see how these two posts are related.
February 19th, 2009 at 10:29 am
All you need to do is look at the cost for taking the Acela from DC to NY. I take that when I travel on a corporate dime, but – on my own nickel, I either fly or drive. Why? Because either one is way, way cheaper.
Just looked up a one-way flight from New York to Boston, and with taxes and fees the very cheapest flight was $124. Add to that the taxi I have to take to get to LaGuardia since there’s no subway that goes to the airport, and it’s another $30, or $154 total.
Amtrak, meanwhile, will carry me from Penn Station in the heart of NY to Back Bay Station in the heart of Boston for…ta da! $89 one way, or a cost sayings of $65 for the train.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
Why do the trolls think it’s important to change their names? Does “Sam M” really think we won’t recognize troll behavior because he’s using a new name?
The ‘tell’ comes when he cites Kevin Drum as an authority on rail travel. Kevin’s probably a nice guy, but what he knows about railroads would fill a thimble, and he has about as much interest in learning what is going on as I do in learning astrology. This all became sadly evident when he tried to blog about California High Speed Rail without even using teh google and ended up doing an Archie Bunker impression.
Yes, “Sam M”, we get your point- proponents of a project should use the most pessimistic estimates, and opponents of the project can use the most pessimistic estimates, and then we can all sit around and do nothing while countries like Spain build high-speed rail through their mountain ranges.
I guess the takeaway here would be that if you elect socialist governments once in a while, all sorts of things can be done.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
DTM,
A lot of the benefits of HSR use come in the form of net positive externalities.
If you think you can show that HSR would produce net positive externalities equal to or greater in value than the public subsidies needed to build and operate it, do so.
This should be good for a laugh.
February 19th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Njorl,
While I think it would be wrong to do so, not doing so represents unilateral disarmament.
So what are you advocating: doing something you believe to be wrong, or “unilateral disarmament?”
February 19th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
DTM,
First, that isn’t quite the right equation–you will want to look at all benefits resulting from the subsidies, not just net positive externalities.
No, you will not want to do that. Public subsidies are justified by PUBLIC benefits, not private ones. If private benefits justify public subsidies, then public subsidies for cars and highways should be massively increased, to cover all the private benefits cars provide to their owners.
Second, obviously such a demonstration has to be done on a case by case basis.
You need to demonstrate it for every “case” where you advocate HSR. You haven’t demonstrated it for any case at all.
This is a study for a Midwest network: http://www.dot.wisconsin.gov/projects/state/docs/mwrri-economic.pdf
That study does not contain an analysis of the value of “net positive externalities” vs public subsidies. Try again.
And this is a study for California: http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/images/chsr/20081118150924_Source%20Document%207%20Benefit-Cost%20Analysis.pdf
That study also does not contain an analysis of the value of “net positive externalities” vs public subsidies. Try again.
February 19th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
DTM,
I figure my car costs me about $10,000 a year all told—depreciation, gas, insurance, registration, maintenance. I get a private annual benefit worth least $10,000 from my car. You think I should get a public subsidy to cover these costs, do you?
February 19th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
DTM,
First, “jason”, are you actually Mixner? Just wondering.
No. Are you actually Ralph Nader? Just wondering.
Look at Exhibit 2 on Page 8. Subtract System Revenues from Total Costs. That gives you the NPV of the estimated public subsidy that would be required for building and operating the system.
No it doesn’t. You are hopelessly confused. The document contains no estimate for public subsidies at all. It simply estimates costs, without any distinction between costs to be paid by public subsidies and costs to be paid by “consumers” of the system. I ask again: show me studies demonstrating that this alleged HSR system, or any HSR system, would produce net positive externalities equal to or greater in value than the public subsidies needed to build and operate it.
That is sort of true (see below), but that doesn’t mean we should exclude consumer surpluses from this sort of cost/benefit analysis.
Of course it does. Consumer surplus is a private benefit, not a public one.
Looking again at Exhibit 2, it would make no sense to ignore the Consumer Surplus, because that is a real benefit produced by the costs expended.
So what if it’s a “real” benefit? The point is that it’s a PRIVATE benefit to the “consumers” of the system. Not a public benefit to other people. So why should other people have to pay for it? You seem completely, completely confused.
February 19th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
DTM,
To apply these notions to your specific example, assuming you receive a consumer surplus above the $10,000 you have to pay, we don’t necessarily need to provide a subsidy to you in order for you to buy the car and get the surplus.
WTF? If the consumer benefits to consumers of HSR should be subsidized by public subsidies, why shouldn’t the consumer benefits to consumers of cars and highways also be subsidized by public subsidies?
February 19th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
DTM,
Look at Exhibit 2 on Page 8. Subtract System Revenues from Total Costs. That gives you the NPV of the estimated public subsidy that would be required for building and operating the system.
Okay, let’s do that:
Total Costs: $9.1 billion
System Revenues: $4.7 billion
Required Public Subsidy: $4.4 billion.
Now lets add up the public benefits from the same table:
Airport Congestion: $1.0 billion
Highway Congestion: $1.6 billion
Airlines: $0.5 billion
Emissions: $0.4 billion
Total Public Benefits: $3.5 billion
Thus, according to your own source and argument, public costs would exceed public benefits by almost a billion dollars. A very bad deal for taxpayers.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
The MWRRI is not High Speed Rail in the sense that the term is used by Matt and in Europe. The MWRRI is merely “Slightly Faster Rail” (SFR). It envisions a TOP speed of 110 mph, and an average speed of 80-90 mph, mostly through upgrades to existing equipment. That’s why it’s so much cheaper than actual HSR. It would avoid much of the huge infrastructure costs that are required for trains to run at true high speeds. And even with those much lower infrastructure costs, it still doesn’t make sense.
February 19th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
serial catowner apparently has a case of the paranoids.
I have never posted here under any other name.
Clown.
February 19th, 2009 at 10:50 pm
DTM,
If you can’t understand how to use that chart
The problem is that you don’t understand it. It says nothing about public subsidies.
February 19th, 2009 at 11:03 pm
DTM,
A subsidy is only necessary if we think there would be suboptimal consumption without a subsidy.
Huh? Why is a subsidy “only necessary if we think there would be suboptimal consumption without a subsidy?” Why is the purpose of public subsidies to “optimize consumption” rather than to pay for the public benefits provided by the service that is being subsidized? And how are you determining the “optimal” consumption of the MWRRI, anyway? What’s the “optimal consumption” of cars and highways? How have you determined that current subsidies are sufficient to “optimize consumption” of cars and highways? Jason’s right. You are totally confused.
February 19th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
DTM,
HSR users are members of the public too. So, benefits accruing to riders, either returned as revenues or taking the form of a surplus, count as “public benefits”.
Ha ha ha ha! Good one. Then benefits accruing to car owners also count as “public benefits.” So you think car owners should get public subsidies to cover their car payments, gas, insurance, maintenance, do you? If not, why should HSR riders get them? Your “argument” is self-contradictory gibberish.
Again, that may not be a necessary program, if we think people are already consuming a roughly optimal amount of cars.
I don’t think that. What is the “optimal” amount of car consumption? How do you make that determination? And what does that have to do with public subsidies?
February 19th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
DTM,
You’re making no sense at all. If your goal is to use public subsidies to produce the “optimal” level of consumption of something you first have to figure out what that optimal level is. How are you doing that? How do you propose we calculate the “optimal” level of consumption of cars, HSR, buses, airplanes, bicycles, ice cream or anything else?
February 20th, 2009 at 11:33 am
DTM,
See here:
What ABOUT it? I asked you how you propose to determine the “optimal consumption” of cars and highways. What is your answer?
Typically what they do is build a model, then try to figure out what level of use would maximize the net benefit (benefits minus costs).
I didn’t ask what “they” do (whoever “they” is supposed to be). I asked how YOU propose to determine it. What is your answer?
Your responses are increasingly incoherent.
February 20th, 2009 at 11:41 am
DTM,
Sure–if a government provided cars to people, those benefits would could as “public benefits”.
Now you’re contradicting yourself. You just claimed that “benefits accruing to HSR riders count as ‘public benefits’” because HSR riders are “members of the public.” Car drivers are also members of the public. Hence, according to you, benefits accruing to car drivers are also public benefits. So why should “benefits accruing” to HSR riders be subsidized but not “benefits accruing” to car drivers?
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