EPA orders Norfolk Southern to conduct all cleanup actions related to derailment

Post by jcranmer » Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 12:52 AM UTC

kevviiinn wrote: post #227

jcranmer wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Essentially, the US government undermaintained the railroads (the modern public transit scourge of "deferred maintenance" practiced a hundred years ago). It ran the railroads with a more or less single-minded mindset to supplying war goods, and after the war was over, kept a heavy touch on the railroads which made them unable to adapt to the increasing competition from heavily-subsidized highways and airlines, which…

According to the wikipedia article, Conrail actually inherited a terrible maintenance situation when the railroads bankrupted and were nationalized. Conrail then proceeded to manage maintenance and got things profitable. It was doing just fine when Reagan decided to privatize for some reason. Nationalizing actually fixed the situation so I don't kmow where you got the impression that it made things worse https://en.m…

Post by thrashh » Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 1:17 AM UTC

ambicapter wrote: post #106

eppp wrote: post #18

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This is a completely broken system though. These cleanup fees should be paid for during the waste generation. Just being allowed to pollute everything and then paying out the owners and declaring bankruptcy leaving it to the tax system to clean up is nonsensical.

What about collecting taxes on these companies while they're operating and then using that tax money to clean up any messes that may occur? Oh wait.

Post by pixl97 » Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 1:23 AM UTC

phpisthebest wrote: post #226

pixl97 wrote: post #206

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Eh, the problem here is you're taking 'government' as a single entity, but it's not at all. If it were up to the singular 'government' there would have been better brakes on the trains and the company would have been following the law on transporting the chemicals. All the issues at hand were well known about for years. The problem here is very little government but instead for profit corporations going "How can I sq…

Right on schedule here we have exactly that I predicted. Government is good, they just did not have enough power to stop the evil capitalism... because the evil capitalism forced other parts of the government to stip the good parts of the government of power... Responses like that should be laughable but far too many people believe that narrative. Never mind that rail is one of the most heavily regulated industries,…

Post by sclarisse » Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 1:27 AM UTC

lesuorac wrote: post #224

sclarisse wrote: post #211

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Returning money to investors is great, whether it’s buybacks or dividends. It’s the core purpose of a company. The primary alternative is growing the bigcorps ever bigger, more powerful, and dangerous. Ever-expanding bloated conglomerates. The good argument against buybacks is that companies tend to do it when the stock is high, and that’s bad for the shareholders.

> It’s the core purpose of a company. It's not though. A state (New Jersey for J&J) gave the company a charter to do X. J&J's charter was not to return money to shareholders [1]. [1]: https://www.investor.jnj.com/_document/johnson-johnson-resta...

Post by s1artibartfast » Wed, Feb 22, 2023, 2:05 AM UTC

ashwagary wrote: post #225

s1artibartfast wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much money and to do what?

Temporary housing for the residents most directly in harms way. Low interest loans for people needing to relocate permanently. Both can help people avoid long term health consequences if this is as dangerous as some observers claim.