Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1899-10-04

| ~N A1hA Of1A OOIlCCb lIOu
the people of the United States an av-
erage of eighty dollars per family each
year. In ten years they collect eight
hundred dollars per family. Just how
much 1t is necessary for them to charge
to get fair profit we do not know.
Possibly the per cent. profit they get
now would be accepted by the general
l public as not unreasonably high. But
If the government owned and operated
the railroads no profit would have to be
charged and therefore the charges
, could be reduced. The reduction of
charges would bring increased travel
| and an increased amount of freight
| and this would enable still further re-
! ductlon. This additional reduction
would still further increase the passen-
gers and the amount OF property to be
carried, making possible yet another
reduction in rates. and so on until the
rates would be So low compared with
what the private companies now charge
| 1T would not be conduciye to q calm
state of mind for one to sit down and
figure out just how much the people
have paid railroad companies more
than they would have had to have paid
for the same service had the govern.
ment owned the roads. OF course, no
one will be able to figure out in ad-
vance what rates the government
would have to charge to cover cost of
maintenance and operating the roads
for the reason he could not know how
much the business of the roads would
increase under the lower rates. We
would not all be surprised if dollar
per car per hundred miles for freight
and twenty-five cents per hundred
miles for travel would be all that it
would be necessary to charge. OF
course the travel would be immense
and the people as whole would, per-
haps, pay for transportation an aggre-
gate as great as they now pay, but they
would get so much more for their mon
ey. Private ownership is a partial EN-.
barge on transportation. The pleasure,
health and education to be secured
from travel are to great extent out of
the reach of the masses of the people un-
der private ownership of railroads.
Under government ownership five dol
lars would carry person two thousand
miles lat twenty-five cents per hundred
miles,, whereas now it will hardly take
him out of the state, to say nothing
about getting back. But may be the
reader will think our figures are
out OF all reason. Perhaps they are.
AS we said above, no one can tell in ad-
vance what the charges would have to
be. We know of one public utility that
is run by the public on charges so much
lower than private companies charge
for the same service that we could not
believe the reported charges until we
sent to the city official for an official
statement. But let us figure a little:
The expense of train men, we believe,
is the principal cost OF operating rail-
roads. Now there are about five men
to train. A passenger train can run
240 miles in eight hours. Allow the
train men each so cents an hour for
their work. Well, five men for one
hour would be three dollars and for
eight hours would be 1914. Suppose
they had an average of one hundred
passengers, at twenty-five cents each
per hundred miles-that is a quarter of
cent mile. This would be 60 cents
per passenger for the 240 miles. 60
cents each for one hundred passengers
would amount to $50. Take a freight
train for same distance and say it takes
twelve hours to make it. Five train
men at 60 cents an hour for twelve
hours, $50. Thirty cars at one dollar
per car per hundred miles, that is a
cent mile per car, or $40 per car for
the 240 miles, SIP. We have over half
the passenger charges and exactly half
the freight charges in excess of the ex-
pense OF train men. Of course these
rates may be impossible, but sure it is
that the public can carry on the rail-
road business at cost and charge much
less than private corporations must to
secure a profit.-Mo. World.