[micromacrofoot]

What I don't understand about initiatives like this is... why bother charging at all? wouldn't the system be more efficient without a fare process? at that point you don't have to maintain an entire money handling system.

[bzzzt]

It would be more efficient for travelers, but not really from a systems point of view. The Netherlands is densely populated and its railways are amond the busiest in Europe. If twice as many people took the train it would be impossible to have enough trains running. Also, a money handling system functions as a gatekeeper. With some regularity there are stories in the media of people misbehaving on public transport. If everybody has the right to board it's more difficult to keep those people out.

[dewey]

"money handling system" scales quite well, and more money is good to have if it's affordable enough for many people?

[micromacrofoot]

but wouldn't the whole system be cheaper if it were paid for by taxes? because at that point you don't have to maintain a point of sale? hundreds of fare boxes, communication systems, physical barriers, auditing, accounting, printing cards, employees to maintain and operate it all... you even save a little time it takes tapping a card to get people on

the tax system is also progressive, so the people who are most capable of paying pay the most and the poor truly pay nothing

charging for a public system seems like pure waste

[eigenspace]

No, it's not even close. Those fares don't cover the whole operation of the train system, but they actually go a long way to covering a very large chunk of it. The cost of operating the fare system is a rounding error relative to the sums of money talked about here.

[micromacrofoot]

ok, but hear me out

let's say the fare system costs $1 million to operate and maintain

and let's say the fare system collects $10 million in fares

couldn't you just collect $10 million in additional taxes, just add a "railway fare" line item, and save everyone the $1 million?

[eigenspace]

1) It's not a 10:1 ratio though, it's much more than that. These fare collection systems are very cheap relative to the money they bring in.

2) If there's sufficient money and will available to fund the transportation system to that level, then sure, that's great. But in most cases, I think it's better to just direct expansions in government train budgets towards expanding the network, not making it cheaper. Most people who drive cars don't drive because trains are expensive, they drive cars because there's no train at the time and place they want. Making trains cheaper doesn't address this problem.

[micromacrofoot]

> If there's sufficient money and will available to fund the transportation system to that level

there is! the system is already funded... people are just paying a portion of it out of pocket now and a bigger chunk out of taxes... the out of pocket part is really the same money but less efficient

[dewey]

> just collect xxx in additional taxes

That's very easy to say, and very unpopular to actually do. People on the country side would for example not feel it's fair for them to pay for the much more complicated public transport system in the city, when they get one train going by their village every few hours for it.

[TheOtherHobbes]

If you have a sovereign currency taxes don't pay for government spending. Governments should spend to expand the economy to its productive capacity (processes, labour, IP, infra of all kinds, social services, R&D), and use taxes to control investment and inflation.

Neoliberal governments don't do this, but they lie about why.

Other than that - of course you could.

Governments also lie about who gets subsidised, and why.

Generally subsidies go to the oligarchy, which makes constant attempts to "cut wasteful and inefficient public spending", because the oligarchy believes poor people don't deserve nice things.

(Not just rhetoric, btw.)

It's a political issue, not a practical one.

There are sociological reasons why you might want some kind of fare income, but they're more to do with adding some token resistance to accessing the system than making money from it.