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[quote user="CJtrainguy"] [quote user="Sam1"] Embedded in the aforementioned costs are charges that on first blush might appear to be fixed costs, but in fact they are variable costs. One example is the insurance premium paid by Amtrak to indemnify the freight railroads that hoist it trains against certain risks arising from the operation of Amtrak's trains. If the long distance trains were discontinued, there would be no need for these premiums. [/quote] I must be missing something here, although I'm not an insurance expert so then again maybe I'm not missing anything. If Amtrak drops LD trains, you say it won't need any indemnity insurance. So are you saying that in addition to dropping LD trains, all state-supported services that don't run 100% on Amtrak owned trackage should be dropped too? Because most of those run over freight railroad tracks. And isn't some kind of indemnity insurance needed on tracks like the NEC, even though it's owned by Amtrak? After all, there are other players on those tracks as well, who might be impacted by a train incident. So maybe a more fair statement would be that if LD trains were dropped, some indemnity insurance might not be needed. Except, what would that do to being able to ferry equipment for service from say California to Chicago over freight railroad tracks? And any drop in cost might not be as big as we might think. Insurers are funny when it comes to pricing. [/quote] I should have said related to hoisting the long distance trains.  A significant majority of Amtrak's miles are run on foreign carrier track where the long distance trains are the only passenger trains carried.  The UP from New Orleans to LA is one example.  How much would Amtrak save in insurance premiums if the long distance trains were eliminated. No one outside of Amtrak would know. And, yes, Amtrak would continue to incur insurance costs. But that was not my main point.  It was that many costs that appear to be fixed in fact are variable.  In fact, in the long run, for a real business, all the costs are variable.
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