A pretty good article I read recently getting into the breakdown of what exactly we're paying more for in the US versus other places.
https://pedestrianobservations.com/2018/01/27/construction-c...
The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
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Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#12TL;DR unions, shady contractors and expensive project requirements in no particular order. Edit: Was this not an accurate summary of the key issues mentioned?
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Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#13TL;DR unions, shady contractors and expensive project requirements in no particular order. Edit: Was this not an accurate summary of the key issues mentioned?
I don’t know enough about the topic to discuss the last two, but unions don’t intrinsically slow down metro development:
France, for example, has one of the largest transport/trade unions (CFTD and CFT) and much stronger union laws than the US. And yet Paris has the second busiest and comprehensive metro in Europe, second only to Moscow. Not to mention how clean it is compared to anything in the US, a beautiful feat of design, architecture and engineering on its own, even!
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Democratic_Confederat...
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#14TL;DR unions, shady contractors and expensive project requirements in no particular order. Edit: Was this not an accurate summary of the key issues mentioned?
Specifically bad union rules. European countries also rely on union labor and don't have this problem. Another factor mentioned in the article is poor management which seems to be a common theme in America.
What do Europeans do differently? In the US the non-corrupt unions fade to obscurity.
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#15TL;DR unions, shady contractors and expensive project requirements in no particular order. Edit: Was this not an accurate summary of the key issues mentioned?
Specifically bad union rules. European countries also rely on union labor and don't have this problem. Another factor mentioned in the article is poor management which seems to be a common theme in America.
I'm reading these articles and wondering: why do these unions have rules for e.g. the number of workers that must be posted to a specific task? Safety? It seems like a tremendously inflexible way to go about it.
I'm genuinely curious btw. I wouldn't be surprised to hear it's a counterreaction to historically irresponsible employers, for example, but I do wonder about the rationale behind U.S. union rules as reported.
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#16The US seems to get less of everything for its money than its peers. Geographic spread is a major macro factor, but you'd still think that a supposedly efficient capitalistic market would at least handle local services better.
For market based goods, the US does deliver pretty phenomenal, innovative and minimally priced outputs. Groceries, energy, technology, etc. "Local services" are almost always driven by non-market based considerations. Politics, not economics, determines contract awards for public works. It's as far from the market as you can get. And our society receives commensurate "value."
Note, too, that the New York City Subway was almost entirely privately funded and built.
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#17The US seems to get less of everything for its money than its peers. Geographic spread is a major macro factor, but you'd still think that a supposedly efficient capitalistic market would at least handle local services better.
> supposedly efficient capitalistic market Unfortunately that's not what we have when dealing with regulations, red tape, unions, and somewhat unaccountable government agencies running the show.
I don't think it's fair to call out unions/government without calling out large capital investors as well. We wouldn't have suburbs or massive shopping malls without huge real estate investors pumping money into major developments that exist to drain money out of a market. Large developments are a net drain on local economies and produce far less efficient markets than small incremental developments based on organic demand. There's a point where regulation and large capital investments are interlinked to prevent these markets from correcting, but the capital does plenty of damage on its own.
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
Specifically bad union rules. European countries also rely on union labor and don't have this problem. Another factor mentioned in the article is poor management which seems to be a common theme in America.
What do Europeans do differently? In the US the non-corrupt unions fade to obscurity.
I wonder if it's that European unions have long had legitimate political clout, while it sounds like in the USA, unions have been under more suppression, and have developed tactics to match?
This is entirely based on my thoroughly unresearched preconception of the matter, BTW.
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
For market based goods, the US does deliver pretty phenomenal, innovative and minimally priced outputs. Groceries, energy, technology, etc. "Local services" are almost always driven by non-market based considerations. Politics, not economics, determines contract awards for public works. It's as far from the market as you can get. And our society receives commensurate "value."
Note, too, that the New York City Subway was almost entirely privately funded and built.
How was that possible and why does it not seem to happen today? What changed? Is it still privately owned?
Re: The U.S. Gets Less Subway for Its Money Than Its Peers
#20The US seems to get less of everything for its money than its peers. Geographic spread is a major macro factor, but you'd still think that a supposedly efficient capitalistic market would at least handle local services better.
> supposedly efficient capitalistic market Unfortunately that's not what we have when dealing with regulations, red tape, unions, and somewhat unaccountable government agencies running the show.
I forgot that Europe is known for its lack of regulations, red tape, unions, and somewhat unaccountable government agencies running the show.