LOL, I suppose next you'll be telling me they do it that way so they can split the train in Chicago and haul half the empties back to Long Beach and the other half back to Prince Rupert?
Murphy SidingWell, don't you have to get that excess power back to where the excess containers and chassis are going?
Okay, I'm no two fisted, hard swinging railroad man,... but pulling a dead locomotive in tow in the middle of a long string of "empty" containers does NOT seem like smart railroading to me. Even out here in the spansive and flat soybean fields of the lower midwest.
I've seen a number of videos of trains with 6 to 8 locos on the head end. Back in the days of first generation power, it'd be no big deal. These days, odds are that only the first couple of units are actually on-line. The rest are along for the ride...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Along I-40 between ALB and Barstow you will encounter many trains with, apparently, more power than needed. Deadheading to where needed would be a reasonable thought.
Convicted One diningcar As we describe what we have seen do we really know if the containers are loads or empties on their way back to west coast ports? Would you expect a train of empties to be using DPU?
diningcar As we describe what we have seen do we really know if the containers are loads or empties on their way back to west coast ports?
Would you expect a train of empties to be using DPU?
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
diningcarAs we describe what we have seen do we really know if the containers are loads or empties on their way back to west coast ports?
charlie hebdo Euclid: The explanation of elasticity was concise and directly relevant. You chose to ignore it (perhaps because you don't understand?) and went off on a circumlocutious tangent to muddy the waters. Result? Another mess.
Euclid: The explanation of elasticity was concise and directly relevant. You chose to ignore it (perhaps because you don't understand?) and went off on a circumlocutious tangent to muddy the waters. Result? Another mess.
Convicted OneFWIW. I see container trains headed to Chicago all the time on Norfolk Southern's New Castle District. I can't say for sure they originate in Florida, but it's a safe bet these have passed through Cincinnati...and very likely Atlanta before that. So, a significant quantity of containers appear to be coming ashore somewhere on the east coast. Perhaps therein lies an opportunity to bypass the western blockade?
But: what are (predominantely) the containers on those trains (Asian, Middle East, European, domestic? Not all the container shipping into North America comes from China and there is a lot of domestic traffice between major North American cities and at least 3/4 of cross country traffic seems to squeeze through the Chicago bottlneck...
and, how do we know they're loaded or empties?
Chris van der Heide
My Algoma Central Railway Modeling Blog
As we describe what we have seen do we really know if the containers are loads or empties on their way back to west coast ports?
Somehow this is occurring and it would seem that westward bound containers on their way toward Chicago might be empties.
Murphy SidingThat's a great idea. It's so great that you and 1000 other desperate apartment builders tried to buy up all the domestic doors available. Overnight, the domestic door market went crazy. Supply can't keep up with demand. Prices went way up. Domestic suppliers had to put everybody on allocation. Not being fools, they also are giving preference to their long-lasting, loyal customers first- at high prices of course.
Well, that's just swell. I think the biggest take away that I've gotten from this thread, is the surprise that there is such an influx of people in South Dakota willing to brave your winters, sufficient that there is such high demand for new apartments?
Further, so little about this thread has centered upon logistics that it makes me wonder if perhaps your true motive here might be to litmus test price increases you intend to share with your own customers?
As if we aren't being assualted enough with the inevititability of inflation everywhere else we go, why should we expect escape here? (you know the drill)
Back to railroading ...FWIW. I see container trains headed to Chicago all the time on Norfolk Southern's New Castle District. I can't say for sure they originate in Florida, but it's a safe bet these have passed through Cincinnati...and very likely Atlanta before that. So, a significant quantity of containers appear to be coming ashore somewhere on the east coast. Perhaps therein lies an opportunity to bypass the western blockade?
rdamon Murphy Siding Convicted One Murphy Siding It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them. Why not buy doors from a domestic manufacturer, temporarily? Just as a tool to leverage your regular supplier. Nothing gets the mesage across quite as well as your supplier realizing you'd sooner take your business elsewhere than be "held-up" by their expeditionary price increases. I've had suppliers undercut their old prices, just to get my business back. That's a great idea. It's so great that you and 1000 other desperate apartment builders tried to buy up all the domestic doors available. Overnight, the domestic door market went crazy. Supply can't keep up with demand. Prices went way up. Domestic suppliers had to put everybody on allocation. Not being fools, they also are giving preference to their long-lasting, loyal customers first- at high prices of course. And they switch to only making the expensive doors not 'contractor grade'
Murphy Siding Convicted One Murphy Siding It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them. Why not buy doors from a domestic manufacturer, temporarily? Just as a tool to leverage your regular supplier. Nothing gets the mesage across quite as well as your supplier realizing you'd sooner take your business elsewhere than be "held-up" by their expeditionary price increases. I've had suppliers undercut their old prices, just to get my business back. That's a great idea. It's so great that you and 1000 other desperate apartment builders tried to buy up all the domestic doors available. Overnight, the domestic door market went crazy. Supply can't keep up with demand. Prices went way up. Domestic suppliers had to put everybody on allocation. Not being fools, they also are giving preference to their long-lasting, loyal customers first- at high prices of course.
Convicted One Murphy Siding It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them. Why not buy doors from a domestic manufacturer, temporarily? Just as a tool to leverage your regular supplier. Nothing gets the mesage across quite as well as your supplier realizing you'd sooner take your business elsewhere than be "held-up" by their expeditionary price increases. I've had suppliers undercut their old prices, just to get my business back.
Murphy Siding It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.
Why not buy doors from a domestic manufacturer, temporarily? Just as a tool to leverage your regular supplier. Nothing gets the mesage across quite as well as your supplier realizing you'd sooner take your business elsewhere than be "held-up" by their expeditionary price increases.
I've had suppliers undercut their old prices, just to get my business back.
That's a great idea. It's so great that you and 1000 other desperate apartment builders tried to buy up all the domestic doors available. Overnight, the domestic door market went crazy. Supply can't keep up with demand. Prices went way up. Domestic suppliers had to put everybody on allocation. Not being fools, they also are giving preference to their long-lasting, loyal customers first- at high prices of course.
And they switch to only making the expensive doors not 'contractor grade'
Murphy Siding Euclid Murphy Siding Euclid BaltACD Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear. Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free. Nonsense. Sure the companies experiencing runaway costs will try to pass them onto the consumer. But if consumers all accepted that, no company would ever fail for lack of controlling their costs. If your widget is not cost effective, you will go out of business. Our consumer market would not have fallen in love with Chinese products had it not been for the lower cost. Why didn’t our domestic manufacturers just pass their higher costs onto our consumers so they would not be driven out of business by cheaper Chinese goods? You're trying to make everything too black and white and textbook perfect. Here's a real world scenario. You're building a $4 million dollar apartment complex. Your doors come from Malaysia and have hit a bottleneck outside of LA/LB. Do you A) Pay more money for whatever you can get B) Hold out until the price comes back down? It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.Why did production move from the rust belt to the south? Then to Mexico, then Cina and now Vietnam/Malaysia/India? Remebr when 'Made in Japan' was a phase used to describe cheap products? So if it is logical and based on common sense and human nature, that is too black and white and textbook perfect? A lot of economics is black and white in the fundamental principle, and that is not invalidated just because there are exceptions. I don’t understand what you believe I am saying that conflicts with the laws of supply and demand. Let me clarify this: Every manufacturer passes all their costs to the consumer since those costs are built into the selling price. But the consumer is always looking for the best price, so there is no guarantee that they will pay the price just because the manufacturer presents them with the product and the price. If a consumer finds a better deal somewhere else, they may refuse to buy the product that they have been buying; simply because its price has been increased. In that scenario, the manufacturer was not able to pass their increased cost/price onto that consumer. So it is not a foregone conclusion that any product cost increase will be paid by the consumer just because they are presented with it. Some will pay it, but a consumer always has the right to simply refuse the purchase, and thus avoid the price increase. That’s all I am saying. Do you disagree with that? You mention manufacturing moving from one low cost source to another as they seek to find the lowest one. It sounds like you are using that to somehow refute what I am saying, but it actually is exactly what I am saying. Look at what I said in my previous post that you quoted about consumers refusing to pay higher domestic prices for manufactured goods when they could get a better deal in China. When China presented U.S. consumers with a lower price than the U.S. price, the U.S. consumers did not tell China, “Oh that is a nice price you have, but sorry, we must pay the higher domestic price because our domestic manufacturers have passed their higher costs along to us.” What I'm saying, is that you seem to believe that every economic theory is black and white, with no gray. What I feel you're not taking into account is what you mentioned above: "all other things being equal". They aren't and there's the rub. If the world were to work like that, you and everyone in your town would be driving small Kia sedans, or whatever is the absolute cheapest car to buy. What year is your Kia?
Euclid Murphy Siding Euclid BaltACD Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear. Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free. Nonsense. Sure the companies experiencing runaway costs will try to pass them onto the consumer. But if consumers all accepted that, no company would ever fail for lack of controlling their costs. If your widget is not cost effective, you will go out of business. Our consumer market would not have fallen in love with Chinese products had it not been for the lower cost. Why didn’t our domestic manufacturers just pass their higher costs onto our consumers so they would not be driven out of business by cheaper Chinese goods? You're trying to make everything too black and white and textbook perfect. Here's a real world scenario. You're building a $4 million dollar apartment complex. Your doors come from Malaysia and have hit a bottleneck outside of LA/LB. Do you A) Pay more money for whatever you can get B) Hold out until the price comes back down? It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.Why did production move from the rust belt to the south? Then to Mexico, then Cina and now Vietnam/Malaysia/India? Remebr when 'Made in Japan' was a phase used to describe cheap products? So if it is logical and based on common sense and human nature, that is too black and white and textbook perfect? A lot of economics is black and white in the fundamental principle, and that is not invalidated just because there are exceptions. I don’t understand what you believe I am saying that conflicts with the laws of supply and demand. Let me clarify this: Every manufacturer passes all their costs to the consumer since those costs are built into the selling price. But the consumer is always looking for the best price, so there is no guarantee that they will pay the price just because the manufacturer presents them with the product and the price. If a consumer finds a better deal somewhere else, they may refuse to buy the product that they have been buying; simply because its price has been increased. In that scenario, the manufacturer was not able to pass their increased cost/price onto that consumer. So it is not a foregone conclusion that any product cost increase will be paid by the consumer just because they are presented with it. Some will pay it, but a consumer always has the right to simply refuse the purchase, and thus avoid the price increase. That’s all I am saying. Do you disagree with that? You mention manufacturing moving from one low cost source to another as they seek to find the lowest one. It sounds like you are using that to somehow refute what I am saying, but it actually is exactly what I am saying. Look at what I said in my previous post that you quoted about consumers refusing to pay higher domestic prices for manufactured goods when they could get a better deal in China. When China presented U.S. consumers with a lower price than the U.S. price, the U.S. consumers did not tell China, “Oh that is a nice price you have, but sorry, we must pay the higher domestic price because our domestic manufacturers have passed their higher costs along to us.”
Murphy Siding Euclid BaltACD Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear. Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free. Nonsense. Sure the companies experiencing runaway costs will try to pass them onto the consumer. But if consumers all accepted that, no company would ever fail for lack of controlling their costs. If your widget is not cost effective, you will go out of business. Our consumer market would not have fallen in love with Chinese products had it not been for the lower cost. Why didn’t our domestic manufacturers just pass their higher costs onto our consumers so they would not be driven out of business by cheaper Chinese goods? You're trying to make everything too black and white and textbook perfect. Here's a real world scenario. You're building a $4 million dollar apartment complex. Your doors come from Malaysia and have hit a bottleneck outside of LA/LB. Do you A) Pay more money for whatever you can get B) Hold out until the price comes back down? It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.Why did production move from the rust belt to the south? Then to Mexico, then Cina and now Vietnam/Malaysia/India? Remebr when 'Made in Japan' was a phase used to describe cheap products?
Euclid BaltACD Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear. Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free. Nonsense. Sure the companies experiencing runaway costs will try to pass them onto the consumer. But if consumers all accepted that, no company would ever fail for lack of controlling their costs. If your widget is not cost effective, you will go out of business. Our consumer market would not have fallen in love with Chinese products had it not been for the lower cost. Why didn’t our domestic manufacturers just pass their higher costs onto our consumers so they would not be driven out of business by cheaper Chinese goods?
BaltACD Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear. Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free.
Euclid ... Therefore, it is unlikely that the cost of stalled container ships will be passed onto the consumer. These costs will be suffered as a loss to the industry. Perhaps these losses will be recouped over time as the shipping industry gradually raises shipping costs at a rate the customer can bear.
Euc I don't know what world you have been living in. In this world, all costs in the chain between origin and ultimate consumer end up being passed on to that ultimate consumer. The world economic system is like a amusement ride - nobody rides for free.
You're trying to make everything too black and white and textbook perfect. Here's a real world scenario. You're building a $4 million dollar apartment complex. Your doors come from Malaysia and have hit a bottleneck outside of LA/LB. Do you A) Pay more money for whatever you can get B) Hold out until the price comes back down? It's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.Why did production move from the rust belt to the south? Then to Mexico, then Cina and now Vietnam/Malaysia/India? Remebr when 'Made in Japan' was a phase used to describe cheap products?
What I'm saying, is that you seem to believe that every economic theory is black and white, with no gray. What I feel you're not taking into account is what you mentioned above: "all other things being equal". They aren't and there's the rub. If the world were to work like that, you and everyone in your town would be driving small Kia sedans, or whatever is the absolute cheapest car to buy. What year is your Kia?
.
EuclidElasticity also applies to the consumers' ability to stretch their supply by doing with less when prices rise. Driving less to save gasoline cost is an example.
This one is the opposite: gas is inelastic. Virtually every study conducted has concluded that gas prices have effectively no influence on gas consumption. People don't drive more when gas is cheap and they don't drive less when gas is expensive. Most usage is usage that must occur regardless of the price. More than ninety-nine percent of an individual's travel is required trips that they must take (commutes, for example). They may defer a vacation because of high gas prices, but that's virtually nothing when it comes to their overall consumption.
Murphy Siding What I'm saying, is that you seem to believe that every economic theory is black and white, with no gray. What I feel you're not taking into account is what you mentioned above: "all other things being equal". They aren't and there's the rub. If the world were to work like that, you and everyone in your town would be driving small Kia sedans, or whatever is the absolute cheapest car to buy. What year is your Kia?
Of course all things are never equal. It is just a standard term when stating a fundamental principle, meaning that the principle stands even though there are endless exceptions. It stands because it is fundamental and vice versa. Nobody using that term means to claim that all things are actually equal. It is just a framework to define the fundamental principle in order that it be clearly communicated and recognized. Stating the term is meant to isolate the fundamental principle from the clutter of endless exceptions that people introduce in order to claim that the fundamental principle does not exist. In other workds, all other things being equal is just an arbitrary, hypothetical condition to separate a fundamental principle from its exceptions.
Here is a formal definition:
Ceteris paribus is a Latin phrase that generally means "all other things being equal." In economics, it acts as a shorthand indication of the effect one economic variable has on another, provided all other variables remain the same.
"A good's price elasticity of demand ({\displaystyle E_{d}}, PED) is a measure of how sensitive the quantity demanded is to its price. When the price rises, quantity demanded falls for almost any good, but it falls more for some than for others. The price elasticity gives the percentage change in quantity demanded when there is a one percent increase in price, holding everything else constant. If the elasticity is -2, that means a one percent price rise leads to a two percent decline in quantity demanded."
"Price elasticity of supply measures the responsiveness to the supply of a good or service after a change in its market price. According to basic economic theory, the supply of a good will increase when its price rises. Conversely, the supply of a good will decrease when its price decreases."
There are formulae for both.
jeffhergertHalloween is right around the corner. Maybe some are stocking up for the festivities.
Nah, that takes too much effort.
Warehouse stores seemed to lose their stockpiles lately and have very little right now (a few months ago they were stocked with TP and paper towels floor-ceiling). Grocery stores have some (like 20% of normal), but the shelves aren't as stocked as they were a month or 2 ago. *shrugs*.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.
greyhounds zugmann The blip came back, it seems. I don't get it. Are you having trouble getting TP? It seems to be in good supply here.
zugmann The blip came back, it seems. I don't get it.
Are you having trouble getting TP? It seems to be in good supply here.
Halloween is right around the corner. Maybe some are stocking up for the festivities.
Jeff
Murphy SidingIt's your call. Just let your investors know what you decide. If you don't want those higher priced doors, the $4 million apartment being built accross the street will take them.
zugmann rdamon We are starting to see surcharges showing up from suppliers. This is a cute way of raising prices without changing the price tag. I would expect a few new ‘dealer fees’ to start showing up on the window sticker if they are not already there. They've been there. If you get a new car at straight MSRP it's a bargain anymore. Many are going for a few grand to a few tens of grand more (Ford Bronco & Kia Tellurides for example).
rdamon We are starting to see surcharges showing up from suppliers. This is a cute way of raising prices without changing the price tag. I would expect a few new ‘dealer fees’ to start showing up on the window sticker if they are not already there.
They've been there. If you get a new car at straight MSRP it's a bargain anymore. Many are going for a few grand to a few tens of grand more (Ford Bronco & Kia Tellurides for example).
charlie hebdo I wish we had an economist in the membership. I recall something about elasticity that applies here.
I wish we had an economist in the membership. I recall something about elasticity that applies here.
rdamonWe are starting to see surcharges showing up from suppliers. This is a cute way of raising prices without changing the price tag. I would expect a few new ‘dealer fees’ to start showing up on the window sticker if they are not already there.
Another thing to consider is that changing the entry port changes the whole distribution pipeline all the way to the consumer. Let's use Amazon as an example. Their California DCs are set up to distribute certain Asian products. If the product is unloaded in Tampa, they have to rework their whole system. Their SE DCs might not be big enough to handle the increased loads.
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