"...Europe is hailed as the holy grail of transportation for its widespread use of trains instead of cars, while the United States is criticized for its reliance on cars and trucks.However, Europeans have achieved this by spending much more on subsidies than Americans, leading to many unintended consequences.
Germany spends more than six times U.S. levels on its sponsored railway company, Deutsche Bahn.
...While the U.S. spends approximately $6 per person per year, Germany spends more than $160 since its population is much smaller.
Despite the subsidies, Deutsche Bahn has kept accumulating debt over the past decade, and it is now more than $20 billion (€17.6 billion).
Conversely, Amtrak has decreased its debt by more than half since 2008, to reach only $1.2 billion last year.
Germany is not an outlier, as subsidized trains in France and Italy are in a worse financial position and spend even more per person.
...On the other hand, airplanes are more environmentally friendly than trains.
Even the European Union has acknowledged the superiority of airplanes and is puzzled at the nonsensical preference of national politicians for trains.
...As Milton Friedman would have said it “Nobody spends somebody else’s money as wisely as he spends his own."
Read all.
No comments:
Post a Comment