After seeing the chaos and enormous economic dislocations caused by the New York Transit Workers strike, municipalities are considering the effects of privatizing public transportation.
If such a movement gains momentum, it would mean that cities would have different privately or publicly held transportation companies, so that if the workers at one company went out on strike, it would not affect competitive companies. Indeed, it might even serve to reduce the possibilities of strikes. Furthermore, if individual companies controlled public transportation, as in the airline industry, municipalities and tax payers would no longer bear the burden of funding enormous pension plans and the high cost of medical insurance.
Privatizing public transportation companies would place them within the structure of a free-market economy, where they would have to operate as do other companies.
And, by the way, when the New York City subway system began, it consisted of several different companies that owned different subway lines, such as the BMT, IRT, and IND, and they operated efficiently and profitably.
