[PRCo]

[Fred Schneider]

My friend of almost a half century, Bruce Bente, passed this comment  
on to me today regarding his Hendersonville, NC Sunday newspaper:
"And there was a fascinating article about the woes of State Highway  
Depts.  Apparently Katrinarita caused enough conservation of gasoline  
that the tax revenues have fallen enough that there won't be enough  
money for highways.  Suggested solutions are to tax people by the  
miles they drive instead of the gasoline consumed, start a campaign  
to get people to drive more and to discourage the use of mass  
transit.  Kafkaesque!"

Some of you (or maybe it was only one of you) asked in the Pittsburgh- 
Railways web site about transit riding going up as a result of  
gasoline prices going up.   By now I'm certain that every one you has  
read something in some newspaper about business at the local bus  
agency going up.   I have not heard anything about it going down as  
we watched the price of gasoline going down.   So, two or three weeks  
ago I asked John Swindler what he saw happening.   He referred to his  
commuter bus.   He parks his car in Hershey and takes the bus to  
Harrisburg every day.   That rids him of about 20 percent of the  
miles and 50 percent of the driving stress.   So John explained to me  
how business went up, and then as the price of regular dropped again  
from $3.00 back to 2.40 he noted that the number of riders dropped  
from 25 back to 20 (a twenty percent drop).   It's now down between  
$2.00 and $2.10 here so I suspect they lost a few more.   How about  
it John?

Hey guys.   If you don't use the gasoline, it won't stay in the  
consumer price index and then can't appear in wage increases.   If  
you shift from steak to potatoes, the costs didn't go up.    <BG>     
You've got to spend the money to get the money back.   And unhidden  
taxes are not in the CPI (unhidden meaning sales and use, income, per  
capita, property, school, head, social security.   After all, giving  
you more money to pay more taxes would be inflationary!    Only non- 
governmental purchases are in the CPI.

No need to reply all --- most of the recipients are hidden in the  
blind carbon line.