Millions of Americans rely on motorcoaches, but the pandemic hit bus companies hard. I say: nationalize it
Joe Biden’s love of trains is well known. “Amtrak Joe” has vowed to invest in America’s crumbling railways and encourage Americans to embrace clean and green mass transit over gas-guzzling automobiles. For decades, the American left has urged the government to make massive investments in rail travel for just these reasons. Yet there is another simple, cheap, and instant way to upgrade our public transit infrastructure, reduce carbon, alleviate traffic, and provide efficient and affordable intercity travel: the government should buy Greyhound.
Greyhound Canada recently announced that the company plans to permanently cease operations there. The move was yet another sign that the financial woes of the inter-city motorcoach industry are not going away. Since the pandemic no transport industry has been more hurt than commercial bus lines. Nearly all schedules for the entire industry were shut down for months with no end in sight; Greyhound USA has recently been able to reopen most of its scheduled routes, but a continued depression in ridership means the company can’t keep all of its lines open. Greyhound has even resorted to selling stations in Chicago and Denver.
Bhaskar Sunkara is the founding editor of Jacobin magazine and a Guardian US columnist. He is the author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequality
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