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US cities pay too much for buses

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Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#351

Post by [deleted] »

trollbridge wrote: post #327
avar wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The second you detach the consumer from the > price of something, even through an > intermediary such as health insurance, that > is when they stop caring about how much > something costs, and so the price jumps. In reality, this claim doesn't survive a cursory glance at the OECD's numbers for health expenditure per capita[1]. You'll find that (even ignoring the outlier that is the US health care system) that in so…

If consumers actually directly paid the whole cost for health services (as opposed to a fixed price, like a $20 copay, etc.), the prices charged would become far more regular. An easy way to examine this is to compare the price of over-the-counter versus pharmaceuticals. If a third party weren't paying for them, the price would have to either come down to something affordable to the average person, or else the market…

[deleted]

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#352

Post by QuantumNoodle »

Whatever solution to increase competition and bring down prices - great. The solution should also either increase bus capacity and/or bus routes to more desirable locations so people would _want_ and _need_ to take the bus.

Are 40 foot buses the right option when ridership is so low in the states? Europe has small van-like busses but more of them. Sure less people fit on one sitting, but routes are tighter, more frequent, and transferring between bus lines doesn't require going waaay out of the way to a hub to transfer. 40 ft busses are great once riders are dependant on it... Seems like a classic case of over optimization.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#353

Post by toomuchtodo »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #112
jvanderbot wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All fun and games to point out seeming contradictions! Especially here. Unfortunately GP is right - optics matters more than factual correctness, and the optics here is mixed - yes gov is overspending, but the solution is to offshore more jobs.

"Government is spending the amount required for developed world jobs to build buses." would be a better title than "US cities pay too much for buses." The macro of deflationary globalization due to enormous surplus labor in the developing world are mostly over. Someone's comment said "why not let China subsidize US bus deployment?" I think that's a fine argument, as long as we're still spending to keep the US manufac…

Citations:

https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/manufacturing-is-a-war-now

https://time.com/7313207/ford-ceo-farley-essential-economy-w...

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#354

Post by WalterBright »

RobKohr wrote: post #202

"Federal funding typically covers 80% of bus purchases, with agencies responsible for the remainder." Well, there is your answer. The one making the purchase isn't the one primarily paying for the purchase. This makes them less sensitive to pricing. Kinda like how expensive healthcare is since it is paid for by insurance. Or how you don't care how much you put on your plate or what you choose to eat at an all you can…

It's not just about not caring. It's a system that is wide open for grift. For example, the mayor awards the contract to X, and X in return donates to his campaign reelection.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#355

Post by russdill »

ecshafer wrote: post #133

I think that the authors solution, outsourcing production is not quite right, they gloss over other issues. >In a large country like the US, some variation in bus design is inevitable due to differences in conditions like weather and topography. But Silverberg said that many customizations are cosmetic, reflecting agency preferences or color schemes but not affecting vehicle performance. This is kind of absurd, I hav…

A very common problem in Metro Phoenix involves government or corporate procurement. They just purchase whatever is used everywhere else and end up with something that lasts well under is rated life time or doesn't even make it though a single summer.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#356

Post by recursive »

Jensson wrote: post #285
baggy_trough wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's false because everyone has alternatives (you can stay home, for example). Raising the price will always on margin reduce trips.

How do you get to work when you stay home?

You wouldn't. If you need to get to work, that wouldn't be the option you would exercise.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#358

Post by namibj »

estebank wrote: post #240
baggy_trough wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Traffic jams are solved by congestion pricing. Parking lot congestion can be solved the same way with pay-parking lots. I don't know what cars have to do with "lost third places".

Congestion pricing works when there are alternatives. If you have both no public transport and congestion pricing, what you have is only increased tax collection with no behavioral change.

No, you'll get car sharing and even if just because you swing by a spot your friend recommended to pick up passengers to near you office, on days you feel like driving yourself, and likely become one such passenger yourself after a couple weeks of that, provided you're not amongst those who couldn't do it without their own car.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#359

Post by namibj »

recursive wrote: post #356
Jensson wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you get to work when you stay home?

You wouldn't. If you need to get to work, that wouldn't be the option you would exercise.

You'd really quickly find a way to work differently as soon as driving in to work to work for a shift becomes a net-negative on your finances.

Be that a pay raise, be that partially remote work, or carpooling.

Re: US cities pay too much for buses

#360

Post by breatheoften »

phil21 wrote: post #287
Y_Y wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And congratulations to any of today's lucky ten thousand who are just learning of the Principal-Agent Problem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal%E2%80%93agent_proble...

I'm convinced that a great majority of problems in the US these days fundamentally boils down to principal agent problems. The 2008 financial crisis is a great example. Once banks no longer kept mortgages on their own books, it just became a matter of time until that was going to blow up. The incentives change.

It takes more than just misaligned incentives to get a banking crisis -- you have to have structural corruption preventing the transfer of the loss gradient back to the "misaligned" decision makers. It's somewhat disingenuous (or overly innocent) to reimagine the pathways which power structural corruption as "innocent ignorance in the face of bad incentives".

The real world has "actually bad" actors -- not just misaligned incentives.

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