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Some congressmen have expressed vehement opposition to Amtrak. In researching this, I asked myself "why?". The answer may lie in finding out who their contributors and PAC donators are. Go to the web site Opensecrets.org for a listing of the FEC filings. For instance, Rep. Mica of Florida received $82,504 from "Air Transport" PACS during the 2003-2004 election cycle and $108,250 during the 2001-2002 cycle. Another member opposed to Amtrak is Ernest Istook of Oklahoma who received $74,429 during the last cycle. Another reason certain Congressmen may oppose Amtrak is because they get preferential and/or free rates to and from Washington. Depending on how that is handled, it may not comply with FEC rules and may be illegal. One way approach to this might be to ask your local new media to investigate whether there is any linkage between the contributions and their opposition to Amtrak. Check out the web site below.
http://www.opensecrets.org
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Let’s Talk About Subsidies
Amtrak carried over 25 million intercity passengers in 2004 (and will carry substantially more in 2005. (www.Amtrak.com).
The Airlines by contrast carried about 550 million domestic revenue passengers (www.bts.gov) according to the U.S. Government Bureau of Transportation statistics. That is 22 times as many passengers as used Amtrak.
The Amtrak Subsidy was approximately $1.2 billion last year.
Now consider the subsidy by tax payers to the airlines. The taxpayer pays for the airports. www.bts.gov indicates there are 207 “hub” airports representing an investment of $3.62 billion + each, conservatively totaling $750 billion. Only a small part of the expense is recovered by ticket taxes and landing fees. The interest on the investment (railroads call it lost opportunity cost which they have to bear on their own infrastructure) at a conservative 7% amounts to $52.5 billion. The additional federal, state and local expenses paid out for support infrastructure, police, fire departments, parking lots, entrance roads, bus operations, etc. amounts to over 10% of the total which adds at least another $7.5 billion. (And this does not even take into account the 603 “non hub” airports!) (Ever hear of “airport authority taxes”)
The taxpayer also pays to train most of the pilots which are trained by the armed forces for $2,000,000 + per pilot. At say 100,000 pilots who fly 15 years for the airlines that amounts to $13.3 billion per year.
Then the taxpayer pays for the air traffic control system at about $14 billion per year (and rising).
In addition, the airports take up valuable ground which if used by a private entity (such as a railroad) would pay property taxes, conservatively estimated at over $31 billion per year.
Now you have the bankrupt airlines, with United alone throwing over $9 billion in unfunded pensions onto the Federal Government. This will probably grow to about $30 billion by the time the rest of the industry files bankruptcy to compete with the lower cost bankrupt carriers that have shed their pension liabilities onto the Government.
The cost of “Airport Security” whose employees are on the Federal Payroll is budgeted at approx. $6 billion in the current budget.
So the airlines are subsidized by even conservative estimates in excess of a $154 billion dollars per year. If Amtrak were to carry the same number of passengers as the airlines, 22 times as many passengers as it now carries, the subsidy would be about 10 times its present subsidy of about $1.2 billion per year, or less than $12 billion per year.
Based on these very conservative estimates, it would be more than 10 times cheaper to carry all passengers by rail than by air and would save the country over $140 billion per year! With the airline industry suffering record and growing losses and fuel prices rising with no end in sight, would it not be prudent to act now to begin to adjust the disparity?
Remember, in the 1950’s you could travel almost everyplace east of the Mississippi overnight by trains traveling up to 110 miles per hour, not even high speed rail, just conventional technology.
