Henry Ford understood this, pay your workers enough to afford the product they make and you will build a society that is better for everyone.
How is it the Chinese economy hasn't figured this out yet? I doubt many workers at Foxconn plants can afford to buy one of the iPhone 6s they make...
When Henry Ford doubled pay so his workers could all buy cars, did he also build parking garages so they could drive them to work?
Right, because when enough consumers wanted an automobile, that caused the industry to burst forth out of the ground, turning out automobiles and creating jobs.
The guy that sat in the garage, working on plans and building prototypes? He was only doing that because the best available market research indicated that people wanted a mode of transportation that didn't produce feces as a by-product.
You've never actually met an entrepreneur have you.
Then why are the workers being forced (extorted) to train their replacements? Seems to me if the previous employees were so incompetent, their employer wouldn't require them to train their replacements.
So what do all those people flying from one place to another in the US do? If you need to drive in your destination then you'll just rent a car like you would have if you flew.
People that fly from city to city:
And in 13 years "High Speed Rail" passengers will do exactly the same thing.
The Northeast Corridor runs from Boston, MA to Washington D.C., a distance of 438 miles according to Google Maps. People ride that train from Boston to NYC, NYC to PHL, PHL to Baltimore, and Baltimore to D.C., as well as other combinations. It is subsidized - it does not cover operating expenses.
They owned the fucking country. No white people lived there. They used slavery.
Not to the extent you seem to think. The bulk of the work out west was done with Chinese immigrants, paid slave wages but they were not literal slaves. The bulk of the eastern portion of the railroad was built in parts of the country where slavery was illegal but the railroads likely employed many ex-slaves.
Like I said:
It took from 1863 to 1869, and was built with largely minority and immigrant workers using manual methods (and dynamite)...
As I recall, the land around the track was "given" to the railroad as compensation for building the tracks.
You are going to have to price it vs the car. That infrastructure is in place and ready to go. It is a sunk cost vs a possible sunk cost in the future.
You have to price this against airline travel, it's here, it's about the same time and cost, and they are equally inconvenient on either end.
This is a solution to a problem that was solved decades ago by regional airlines...
So? For $5 I can do the same thing in Dallas today.
Wow, in 13 short years riding the train between SF and LA will be just like flying between SF and LA is right now, for the same cost.
And we are calling this train 'the future' of transportation? Seems like it's really just state of the art, circa 1975.
You know what, I have to pay for auto insurance if I leave my car at home for a week, take a week and drive back and forth between SF and LA, if I drive to the airport and leave my car parked at the airport OR the train station.
You still have to pay for car insurance even if you don't drive your car.
How long did the transcontinental railroad take to complete? It took from 1863 to 1869, and was built with largely minority and immigrant workers using manual methods (and dynamite)...
We're at what 15 years for a 500 mile run up the coast using the latest technology...
We could do better.
Maybe California could offer completion bonuses like the state DOT did to fix the one highway after an earthquake?
On the low end, they estimate 18 million riders a year. Ok, dividing 18 million by 365 days leaves you with almost 50,000 passengers a day. Divided by two, that's about 24,000 passengers SF->LA, and 24,000 passengers LA->SF each day. If they run 24 trains s day, leaving each hour, that means 1,000 passengers per hour, every hour, every day.
Seems unlikely.
Maybe they'll run trains every two hours, but then they gotta stuff 2,000 people on each train 12 times/day, every day.
know the arguments about the population density from the economic point of view, they are correct, but i think California is a right place for trains.
This solves a problem that has already been solved.
Planes travel between SFO and LAX for around $100-150 each way. It takes several hours (all in TSA, waiting, flying, etc), you can work while you wait/fly, and when you arrive at the airport there are dozens of transportation services to get you on to your final destination (buses, light rail, rental cars, etc).
Flying is a pain in the ass. You need to go to an airport, get groped, wait an hour until you can board, sit in an uncomfortable seat, get fed a tiny drink if you're lucky when they want to feed it to you, use a bathroom that's tiny and uncomfortable, and wait for another 40 minutes for your luggage afterwards.
A fair assessment.
A train is just a much better experience. You can show up 2 minutes before departure, get on without a strip search, get a nice big seat, have a dining car, can get up and walk around at will, and just grab your luggage on the way out.
Your imagined high speed train ride is pure fantasy. There will be a TSA checkpoint (high-speed rail will be a terrorist target), trains will run only a couple times a day, so here comes a couple hours wait time for the next train, and you are still going to be surrounded by strangers and your luggage will have to be checked. Oh, and this 'getting work done while I'm on the train' fantasy? Are you going to pay extra for a seat with a work surface?
Oh no, I'm sure trains in the future will be fantastic, completely unlike today's trains.
You knew the job was dangerous when you took it, Fred. -- Superchicken
