From: marc.gr.vandyck@invalid.skynet.be

Robert Heller explained on 10/11/2016 :
> At Wed, 9 Nov 2016 20:18:52 -0600 Larry Sheldon  wrote:
>
>>
>> On 11/9/2016 16:06, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote:
>>> What will happen to Amtrak as a result of the election, Trump as
>>> president and a Republican congress?  Republicans hate Amtrak.
>>>
>>
>> Actually, what we hate is pissing money down gopher holes.
>>
>> Our guess is, if anybody wanted Amtrak, some entrepreneur would be
>> making a million at it.
>
> No, actually it does not work like that. Sometimes the "Free Enterprise"
> system simply fails. In fact the "Free Enterprise" / "Private Sector" is
> *notoriously* bad at any kind of infrastructure. *Non* of the infrastructure
> *anywhere* in the world and at any time was ever build by the Private Sector
> alone. Much of the construction of the existing *freight* railroad
> infrastructure was funded by the federal government (in the form of land
> grants in the latter part of the 1800s).  The *entire* highway system is
> funded by governments at the local, state, and federal level.  Many airports
> started out as millitary air bases.  The US Airforce has been the primary
> training ground for pilots.
>
>
>>

Land grants are a thing of the past, but to stay with railroads of
today, have you noticed how efficient the private railway sector has
been at solving the problem of Chicago ? They are just getting
nowhere... unless public funds are thrown at them with programs
like CREATE. So, yes, sure...

--
Marc Van Dyck

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