Public Transport privatisation (1 Viewer)

[volition]

Just tossing the idea out there, anybody got any thoughts?

Here's a link to some report about the privatisation down in Victoria.

http://ipa.org.au/publications/publisting_detail.asp?pubid=665 - Victoria's Public Transport: Assessing the results of privatisation

 

[Sparcod]

Not (yet) for NSW. There's still a lot of work left for the NSW government to build new railways and to raise it to the point where it's worth selling.

Is the transport sector (not aeroplanes and airports but roads and railways) a good thing to privatise?

 

[han-]

I find it interesting that Victoria's public transport privatisation has been hailed a success by the group, given that every day I read in the mX about what a shambles the public transport system is and how privatisation has ruined it.

 

[Nebuchanezzar]

No.

 

[jb_nc]

No. Maybe they are run like private companies but funded by the state.

 

[wuddie]

you mean corporatise the state transit?

but privatisation is the worst idea. as if the public transport system isn't bad enough as it is, if the private sector invests in it and doesn't see returns within a few years, they'll just ditch, and then what?

so nah, as bad as it is, state should keep it.

just throw more money at it.

 

[bshoc]

No. Whilst inefficient (i.e. everyone paying for things only some use), public transport generates positive externalities, such as allowing people on low incomes to seek work in a wider radius around their place of residence.

 

[withoutaface]

No. Whilst inefficient (i.e. everyone paying for things only some use), public transport generates positive externalities, such as allowing people on low incomes to seek work in a wider radius around their place of residence.

But if that work doesn't even generate enough income to properly cover the costs of transport it incurrs, then wouldn't those people be better off on welfare, or working somewhere closer to their residence?

 

[bshoc]

But if that work doesn't even generate enough income to properly cover the costs of transport it incurrs, then wouldn't those people be better off on welfare, or working somewhere closer to their residence?

Well the assumption is that it does in the long run, besides public infrastructure has non-economic benefits as well ..

 

[withoutaface]

Such as? Going to visit my grandmother? If I'm not prepared to pay $10, or whatever the full cost of a bus fare to her house is, to do so, why should the taxpayers, who don't know either of us?

 

[Iron]

Canberra buses are government owned, and all sorts of interesting things get done to them. For example, the govt has been known to gut a lot of services mid-term, then return them in an election year, or switch services to inconvenient times, then use the subsequent low numbers on the new routes as justification for scrapping the route all together.
It's essentially unprofitable for them, but they keep it to play politics with.

 

[jb_nc]

Such as? Going to visit my grandmother? If I'm not prepared to pay $10, or whatever the full cost of a bus fare to her house is, to do so, why should the taxpayers, who don't know either of us?

yeah seriously ive had enough of paying for little timmy's chemotherapy, i dont even know the chump

 

[withoutaface]

yeah seriously ive had enough of paying for little timmy's chemotherapy, i dont even know the chump

If little Timmy has leukemia that's fine, and covered by the part of my policy which says "if his parents genuinely can't afford healthcare, the government should step in".

Next hypothetical.