He has roughly pieced together a surprising amount of data. If the impreciseness of smog and congestion costs are disturbing, it may merely reflect the newness of our attempts to qualify such costs. Possibly the inexactness of the estimates will be less disturbing when we remember that such presumably solid matters as constructions costs have in recent years been substantially miscalculated in the case of the San Francisco and Washington, D.C. public transit systems. Elliot's concern with the possible regressive nature of transportation costs relative to lower income groups does, however, to me seem misplaced. Our concern should be that non-users subsidize users.
All public actions affect the distribution of income.
It seems a needless restraint to make every policy fit an income distributional requirement when equity in income distribution can be treated as one single matter through taxes and transfer payments being designed to offset not only what may be deemed to be the undesirable income distribution effects of the market, but of governmental policies as well. The variables in the picture keep changing and with their change there are further feedbacks. Second, it seems reasonable to believe that the increasing recognition of smog and congestion costs must lead to increased pressures to get the motorist out of his automobile. Incentives politically are likely to be more acceptable than disincentives. Offers of express buses, para transport systems, etc. meet this requirement, but probably will not be sufficient.