Riders refuse to pay on more than one-third of all Metrobus trips

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Democrats are doing a swell job of leading and serving the people of DC!

What have Republicans ever done for the homeless mentally ill? Oh yeah, that's right, kick them out of the institutions to live in the gutter. Tell mentally ill homeless people who are too messed up to hold down a job to "get a job." Mindnumbingly stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just another example of a democrat run city that legalizes illegal behavior. Do you really need a slide ruler to figure out why crime is skyrocketing in blue cities? They tolerate this bullsh*t.

I am a democrat, but I agree with this. The whole push towards decriminalization of fare evasion has inevitable consequences in terms of undermining payment morale, with the result that, in the end, no one will pay.

It is time to recognize the "defund the police", get police out of schools, restorative justice etc. is an unmitigated disaster, and we have to react against it. A society depends on rules, and those rules must be enforced when they are evaded. Otherwise the consequence is not fairness, but chaos.

On the contrary , these are winning strategies at the ballot box.

I mean, it is only a transit fair. It’s nothing! Why can’t our grossly rich society cover that?

And have you turned on the TV lately ? The tube has turned. Racial social justice is the topic of every show, every add every newscast - so people obviously want this.

The danger is abandoning a winning strategy while ahead.

[Anonymous]

Tide not tube.

[Anonymous]

Why is reducing Metro’s income by 1/3rd a problem?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just another example of a democrat run city that legalizes illegal behavior. Do you really need a slide ruler to figure out why crime is skyrocketing in blue cities? They tolerate this bullsh*t.

I am a democrat, but I agree with this. The whole push towards decriminalization of fare evasion has inevitable consequences in terms of undermining payment morale, with the result that, in the end, no one will pay.

It is time to recognize the "defund the police", get police out of schools, restorative justice etc. is an unmitigated disaster, and we have to react against it. A society depends on rules, and those rules must be enforced when they are evaded. Otherwise the consequence is not fairness, but chaos.

It’s definitely unfair. And guess who suffers the most. Working class and middle class families who get stuck footing the bill. Who is going to pay for these riders? Hard-working people who ride Metro and DO actually pay a fare. Not the super wealthy, who never even ride Metro.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just another example of a democrat run city that legalizes illegal behavior. Do you really need a slide ruler to figure out why crime is skyrocketing in blue cities? They tolerate this bullsh*t.

I am a democrat, but I agree with this. The whole push towards decriminalization of fare evasion has inevitable consequences in terms of undermining payment morale, with the result that, in the end, no one will pay.

It is time to recognize the "defund the police", get police out of schools, restorative justice etc. is an unmitigated disaster, and we have to react against it. A society depends on rules, and those rules must be enforced when they are evaded. Otherwise the consequence is not fairness, but chaos.

On the contrary , these are winning strategies at the ballot box.

I mean, it is only a transit fair. It’s nothing! Why can’t our grossly rich society cover that?

And have you turned on the TV lately ? The tube has turned. Racial social justice is the topic of every show, every add every newscast - so people obviously want this.

The danger is abandoning a winning strategy while ahead.

You can tell the posters who don't really live here... DC didn't defund its police.

[Anonymous]

If it’s about money wouldn’t it bring more money in if we audited more peoples taxes since we know people are fraudulent on paying all the taxes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is reducing Metro’s income by 1/3rd a problem?

What’s absurd is that Metrorail ridership is at 1/4 prepandemic levels but bus ridership has increased. These people probably don’t have a significant net impact on Metrobus farebox collection based on pre-pandemic levels. If they concerned about fare recovery, the better approach would be to make Metrorail safer and reliable to convince more people to use it. Instead they want to target the only successful thing that’s happened for WMATA since the pandemic started.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I actually think metro bus should be free and we should just allocate taxes to it. This is an expensive city and free public buses would be an investment in a mobile work force. We could require some form of ID so that only District residents could skip paying (not photo ID, but like a metro card that didn't require payment that was only available to residents). It wouldn't be perfect, but it would help people get around.

I used to work at a legal clinic for low income clients and it was not uncommon for people to struggle to come to court dates or other appointments because even finding a few dollars for the bus was a challenge.

I think the buses in Portland, OR are free. In San Francisco, Muni is free to all kids up to 18/hs graduation. They have a metro card they're supposed to "boop" so the city can track who's using the mass transit system and how often.

Its already free for kids in D.C.

No it isn’t.

Yes it is. See the Kids Ride Free program.

Kids that enter the system are not automatically allowed to ride free. They can ride free through that program if they are DC residents enrolled in DC schools and have a pass. If they do not carry the pass with them they are not allowed to ride free.

No one checks anymore though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I actually think metro bus should be free and we should just allocate taxes to it. This is an expensive city and free public buses would be an investment in a mobile work force. We could require some form of ID so that only District residents could skip paying (not photo ID, but like a metro card that didn't require payment that was only available to residents). It wouldn't be perfect, but it would help people get around.

I used to work at a legal clinic for low income clients and it was not uncommon for people to struggle to come to court dates or other appointments because even finding a few dollars for the bus was a challenge.

I think the buses in Portland, OR are free. In San Francisco, Muni is free to all kids up to 18/hs graduation. They have a metro card they're supposed to "boop" so the city can track who's using the mass transit system and how often.

Its already free for kids in D.C.

No it isn’t.

Yes it is. See the Kids Ride Free program.

Kids that enter the system are not automatically allowed to ride free. They can ride free through that program if they are DC residents enrolled in DC schools and have a pass. If they do not carry the pass with them they are not allowed to ride free.

No one checks anymore though.

No one checks adults or kids anymore. But since the discussion is about fare evasion, a kid that rides Metrobus or Metrorail without a pass or showing their pass that they received from their school is part 1/3 of Metrobus riders and 2% of Metrorail rider that WMATA is saying are evading fares.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If it’s about money wouldn’t it bring more money in if we audited more peoples taxes since we know people are fraudulent on paying all the taxes.

I don't think it is an either/or question. Yes, of course we should fund the IRS and crack down on tax evasion. The arguments about fairness apply in the same way.

We as a society agree rules, and they should be enforced across the board. We shouldn't have democrats arguing that the poor can ignore the laws and republicans defunding the IRS so the rich can get away with paying little or no tax. Let's try to find a center and moderation again...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If it’s about money wouldn’t it bring more money in if we audited more peoples taxes since we know people are fraudulent on paying all the taxes.

Tax audits are expensive for the IRS to conduct, even more so during the pandemic, so auditing more people wouldn't necessarily bring in more money. There's also the fact that if they increased audits they would catch far more lower-income people -- who are more likely to do taxes themselves and make honest mistakes that would trigger an audit -- than higher-income people, who have the financial means to have their taxes done by an accountant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just another example of a democrat run city that legalizes illegal behavior. Do you really need a slide ruler to figure out why crime is skyrocketing in blue cities? They tolerate this bullsh*t.

I am a democrat, but I agree with this. The whole push towards decriminalization of fare evasion has inevitable consequences in terms of undermining payment morale, with the result that, in the end, no one will pay.

It is time to recognize the "defund the police", get police out of schools, restorative justice etc. is an unmitigated disaster, and we have to react against it. A society depends on rules, and those rules must be enforced when they are evaded. Otherwise the consequence is not fairness, but chaos.

Another democrat who strongly agrees with this. If you want to make the metro free, do so. The decriminalization of fare evasion is nonsense.

[Anonymous]

Wait, so for $20M per year we can make metro free?

That seems like a really good deal.

Plus you can deduct the cost of fare collection, and the buses would run faster if people could just board.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If it’s about money wouldn’t it bring more money in if we audited more peoples taxes since we know people are fraudulent on paying all the taxes.

Tax audits are expensive for the IRS to conduct, even more so during the pandemic, so auditing more people wouldn't necessarily bring in more money. There's also the fact that if they increased audits they would catch far more lower-income people -- who are more likely to do taxes themselves and make honest mistakes that would trigger an audit -- than higher-income people, who have the financial means to have their taxes done by an accountant.

Nonsense. You can set a dollar value to trigger an audit. No one wants to go after people for a few hundred dollars caused by an honest mistake. The IRS has been defunded to such an extent that a small investment in additional audits brings in very large amounts of money. We are well below the point where an additional dollar spent on an audit of the rich would bring in less than a dollar of additional revenue. Look at page 306 of the link below to see the CBO's estimates of the returns to higher spending on IRS enforcement:
https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2019-06/54667-budgetoptions-2.pdf