Metrik Minute

I recently heard a conversation on the train about MUNI officers citing
people and how this is unfair during hard economic times.  The
peoples’ emotions placed the frustration on the increase in citation
officers. They complained about the immorality of it, esecially during

difficult times like these.

MUNI train - K/T Line Inbound

The conversation started among the disgruntled riders because a couple
of MUNI officers stepped onto the train to check tickets. Immediately
following their appearance a dude tried to abandon ship, only to be
quickly questioned and caught by the agents of paranoia and tickets.
The people on the train got all flustered when they saw that the
agents were actually citing the poor young misunderstood gentleman,
trying his best to just make his way through this tough and merciless
city.  you could see it in his eyes and moving mouth the desperation
to talk his way out of the situation, employing empathy, economic and
minority status, and stupidity.  That or he’s an economist, just like
all of all of us, who calculated his risks by not paying the fare, got
caught, and now is paying his dues because his investment just failed.
To me, this is the Free Market in its purest – young man calculates
his risk, takes a chance, and hopes for the best, relying on his
skills to get him by. Unfortunately, his skills weren’t sharp enough
to out pace the speed of the MUNI centurians.
But such is the “Market”, and MUNI understands this Market, so they
protect their own investment by hiring the enforcers to make sure
their investments in public transportion pay off. It makes sense to
me; I mean, wouldn’t you protect your business if people were stealing
from it or not paying you for your services?

It was him, he did it!!

Here is my assessment of why more enforcement officers have been hired
to enter random trains and buses and make sure people are paying their
tickets.  Times are tough economically. Gas, bills, and debt are up
while jobs, wages, and work hours are down.  The not-so-rich are hit
hardest.  More people are taking public transport instead of driving to save on gas,
toll, and other travel costs.  MUNI ridership is up.  But at the same
time, right in the mix of the downward economic spiral is the cycle of
violence, theft, and general lawlessness.  One of those examples is
the calculated risk of people getting away with not paying the MUNI
fare.  It makes sense because MUNI is notoriously easy to get onto
without paying the fare – just hop on at an above-ground station
during a busy time and blend in with the chaos of the people getting
off.  Easy to pull off, relatively low risk, or used to be, and you
save what is soon going to be two dollars per ride, and during these
times all savings add up.

But see it from MUNI’s point of view; Ridership is up, therefore there
is a demand for more drivers, which meeans that there is a need to pay
people more.  And while theoretically the need to pay for more drivers
and train operators should be offset by more fare from the increase in
riders, it is not because people are cheating the rules and are freeloading.

This is the beauty of the Free Market system – people, organizations,
and businesses can offset the risk in their situations with various
solutions, in this instance hiring more security to make sure people
pay.  The expense of the security just happens to be paid by the
cheaters of the system, and paid they are!.  I asked a security
officer on my way out of the station if he knew whether the policing
has been effective or not, if the revenue from the ridership has been
felt in the company, and what percentege of the revenue has been
coming from citations.  He said that while he wasn’t privy to all the
information on the inside, this program was indeed starting to show
results in terms of higher revenue, though he grumbled that very
little of it was seen by the workers.

That makes sense to me – MUNI has been in serious financial trouble
for a while and has been steadily raising rates.  At the end of this
month its raising its rates from $1.50 to $2.00 in an attempt at
stabilizing. It has been suffering quite a lot lately as city hall has
cut its funds due to a shortage of funds themselves.

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