The Capitalist Lie of "Profitable" Transit
Abigail Muccilli
5/31/2025
Public transit isn’t a business—it’s a right. Just as we don’t expect firefighters to turn a profit or highways to pay for themselves, we must reject the lie that buses should 'break even' while corporations extract billions from car dependency. But under capitalism, even essential services are forced to justify their existence as revenue streams rather than public goods, resulting in crumbling infrastructure, unreliable service, and a system that prioritizes corporate interests over people’s needs. In Louisville, this capitalist logic has starved TARC into dysfunction, leaving working-class and Black riders stranded by design. While highways and corporate subsidies get blank checks, the Transit Authority of River City (TARC) is left scrambling for funding, trapped in a cycle of fare hikes and service cuts. When transit budgets are squeezed to meet arbitrary financial targets, the consequences are immediate and devastating: aging buses go unrepaired, wait times grow longer, and service becomes unreliable. As quality deteriorates, riders abandon the system. Then, when ridership drops, politicians and corporations point to its 'failure' as proof it should be defunded or privatized, leading agencies to cut routes and raise fares in a self-defeating cycle of decline. This isn’t inefficiency; it’s sabotage.
In Louisville, the crisis of public transit is not just about funding—it’s about systemic racism. The disparities in service mirror decades of segregation, redlining, and disinvestment in Black neighborhoods, playing out in stark disparities. When Atlanta’s Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority (MARTA) proposed expanding into wealthy, white suburbs in the 1970s, politicians blocked it, fearing ‘undesirable’ riders. Today, those same suburbs enjoy taxpayer-funded commuter rail—while Black neighborhoods remain transit deserts. Louisville’s highway expansions and TARC cuts follow the same racist playbook: isolating Black workers from opportunity, then blaming them for ‘not wanting jobs.’ Routes prioritize downtown business corridors while West Louisville—a predominantly Black community with some of the city’s highest poverty rates—gets neglected. Workers miss job opportunities because buses don’t run frequently enough, or at all, during off-peak hours. Shift workers, many of them Black and low-income, struggle to reach jobs because buses don’t run early enough for pre-dawn shifts or late enough for night work. A 2023 study from KentuckianaWorks found that 1 in 4 low-wage job seekers in Louisville turned down work because they couldn’t reliably get there. Without affordable transit, the working poor are forced into car debt—devouring incomes already stretched to the breaking point. This is transit apartheid: a direct continuation of Jim Crow-era policies that restricted Black mobility. Just as segregationists once fought to keep Black riders off streetcars, today’s corporate interests profit from keeping Black communities isolated, underpaid, and car-dependent. In the Jim Crow era, streetcars were segregated, and Black riders were forced to stand even if seats were empty. After desegregation, white flight and highway construction gutted Black neighborhoods, while transit funding flowed to suburban commuters. Today, TARC’s route decisions still reflect this legacy—prioritizing wealthier (and whiter) areas while leaving Black communities behind. The fight for better buses is part of the larger struggle against structural racism.
Transit equity is also a form of climate justice. It centers the needs of working-class and marginalized communities who are disproportionately harmed by car-dependent infrastructure and climate collapse. Under capitalism, transit systems are chronically underfunded while public resources are funneled into subsidies for electric vehicles—a luxury for the wealthy that does nothing to dismantle the unsustainable, profit-driven systems of sprawl and extraction. Louisville’s air quality ranks among the worst in the U.S., with West Louisville bearing the brunt of toxic emissions. While the city spends millions on electric vehicle chargers for wealthy neighborhoods, TARC’s diesel buses still choke frontline communities. Real climate action means zero-emission buses, free transit, and dismantling the car-centric sprawl that fuels both pollution and poverty. By prioritizing collective mobility over private car ownership, we challenge the corporate forces that sacrifice both the planet and the working class for profit, while building the infrastructure of a just, post-carbon future. The fight for transit equity is thus a fight against capitalist exploitation, carceral urban planning, and ecological destruction—all of which are rooted in the same oppressive logic of endless growth and private accumulation.
This isn’t fiscal responsibility—it’s class war. The wealthy get public money for stadiums, corporate tax breaks, and endless road expansions, while working-class Louisvillians are told buses must "break even." Auto dealers, oil companies, and real estate developers profit from car-dependent sprawl, while politicians serve their interests. For example, Louisville’s Ford’s truck plant received $40 million in tax breaks in 2022, while TARC begged for scraps. Meanwhile, Koch Industries–whose refinery dominates River Road—lobbies against climate-friendly transit nationwide. These corporations don’t just profit from car dependency; they buy politicians to enforce it. Additionally, zoning laws prioritize parking over people; highway expansions drain public coffers; and tech "solutions" like fare apps skim profits for middlemen. On the other hand, Louisville allows police and military budgets to balloon without question, with LMPD receiving annual budget increases, while TARC begs for scraps. Cities that invest in transit see the benefits. In 2022, Cincinnati overhauled its entire bus network with Reinvent Metro, shifting from a downtown-centric model to a high-frequency grid system. The changes led to a 15% ridership growth on revamped routes within a year, more reliable service, with buses every 15 minutes on core routes and equity-focused improvements, prioritizing underserved neighborhoods. Nashville, despite a failed referendum proposed in 2018, has seen increased frequency on key routes due to their 2023 Better Bus redesign. IndyGo’s Red Line BRT, launched in 2019, faced early hiccups but has since exceeded ridership projections, leading to new network expansions to be implemented in 2028. Louisville could make similar advancements—if it rejects the myth that transit must turn a profit.
Transit workers’ unions, when allied with community movements, have proven they can beat back austerity and demand a system that serves people over profit. When labor and community unite, they win. In 2019, the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 241 of Chicago led a campaign against service cuts and for better wages, while community groups like Commuters Take Action organized against fare hikes. Their pressure helped secure better funding and avoid drastic cuts. Cincinnati’s ATU Local 627 partnered with Better Bus Coalition, a rider advocacy group, in 2019 to organize protests and lobby for increased funding. Their campaign pressured the city to allocate $10 million in federal COVID relief funds to avoid cuts. Louisville doesn’t have to accept a failing transit system, but must face reality: the real inefficiency isn’t in public funding—it’s in a capitalist model that treats human mobility as a commodity rather than a right.
The solution isn’t minor tweaks, but a fundamental shift in how we fund and value transit. We must fight for free, fully funded transit—paid for by taxing the rich and slashing bloated car-centric budgets—with routes that serve people, not profits, prioritizing working-class neighborhoods over downtown business loops. The TARC 2025 plan, like so many others, tinkers at the edges rather than demanding the full public investment transit deserves.
Yet, while TARC 2025 may not undo decades of systemic underinvestment, it does make incremental improvements: modernizing routes, enhancing accessibility, and testing new service models. These steps, though limited, keep the struggle alive, proving that even under capitalism, collective pressure can force concessions. But let’s be clear: reform alone will never be enough. Without revolution, capitalism will always place public goods like transit under constant threat—starved, privatized, or dismantled entirely to protect profit over people.
The fight for better transit must be part of a larger fight to overthrow a system that treats human needs as secondary to corporate greed. Incremental gains are worth winning, but the only way to secure transit as a permanent, universal right is through radical change. The ruling class will never willingly fund the transit we deserve—we must take it from them.