Ezra’s point was that comparing transportation infrastructure between rail and roads is apples to oranges because one gets 40 billion dollars worth in subsidies and the other gets around 2 billion.

While in practice its usually more complicated, you do in at least this situation get what you pay for. Are you arguing that Amtrak wouldn’t be in a significantly better position if it received as much funding as the high way system.

More broadly though I think your analysis suffers from a lack of context. Historically, institutionally, and economically the high way system is embedded deep within our transportation system. We have invested billions of dollars over the past 50 years, those investments make the high way seem cheaper. By contrast, public transportation is under funded and ignored. The start up costs to get it going are concomitantly greater.

anyway, this illustrates another problem with amtrak subsidies — they’re likely to strangle the nascent market for high-comfort, cheap, intercity bus transport.