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Some suggested reading. The Northwestern book by Grant goes into some detail about what was going on economically during the 40's and how it affected the railroads. Briefly, 27% inflation, a national coal strike, a wage freeze for almost 3 years, labor shortages and the use of temps for back office work during the war. The freeze was lifted in '46 and wholesale prices rose 31% in the next 10 months. The railroad operating unions negotiated a 30% raise in steps from '46 to '48. The 40 hour work week also came back into play and the railway clerks retained 48 hous worth of pay for 40 hours work. The railroads were granted a modest rate increase by the ICC, but it did not fully compensate for the increased labor costs. Revenue went up in '47 & '48 but earnings fell. The decade ended in recession starting in '49. The LA&SL book by Signor goes into the benefits of diesels on the southwestern part of the UP. Diesels were able to run across the entire division, eliminated many helper districts and reduced the number of assignments for those that remained. Dynamic brakes eliminated the setting, inspection, and release of retainers on many grades and the number of brakemen was reduced from 5 to 3 on many trains. Because of seniority, enginemen who held down road assignments ended up on the extra board and didn't see road work again for many years. A reprint of tonnage ratings for the division shows that an A-B-B-A set of F3's is equal to 1.7 Challengers on Cajon from San Bernadino to Summit. The heavier FA's are equal to 2 Challengers, despite having 2000 less horespower. Steam Motive Power of the UP by Kratville and Ranks has a similar tonnage rating chart for all classes of power across all portions of the Nebraska division(p. 213). Here 3 1500 hp diesels have a slightly higher tonnage rating than a Big Boy. This book also talks about UP dieselization in general. Briefly, as the western districts were dieselized, modern steam was moved east, but on the Nebraska and Kansas divisions it didn't replace the oldest power in use. Both had many lightly built branch lines served by turn of the century 2-8-0's. What went into the storage/scrap lines were the heavier 2-8-2's, 4-6-2's, 4-8-2's, many 2-10-2's, and finally the 4-12-2's. When the divisions were dieselized in 1954, GP9's replaced everything in all types of service. From NYC steam, the last Niagras purchased in '48 cost $292,000 and these engines were running 27,000 miles/month, as good as the diesels. At this rate they would have hit 1 million miles in 3 years. From Monarchs of the West in Classic Trains, the UP FEF-1's built 10 years earlier were running 15,000 miles/month and would have taken 5.5 years to reach 1 million miles. Other than roller bearing rods, the technology on the Niagras was not dramatically different, so they would have reached the end of their service lives when measured in years much faster than the UP Northerns. That high availability diesels did the same is really no surprise. IMO, the entire decade is so atypical and full of economic distortions, that accurate forecasting is very problematic, both for the decision makers of the time or anyone using it as a basis for statistical analysis and projection. Given the rates of inflation and the 30% increase in labor costs, it's not at all surprising that railroad management jumped all over anything which could improve productivity and were willing to pay for it any way they could.
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