Anti-Rail Radio Host’s Numbers Are Pure Bunk

It’s the same radio host featured in last Friday’s post – the one who tries to whip up his audience with his over-the-top anti-rail delivery. It's nearly always the same stuff, but if you listen closely, you’ll find some extraordinarily amazing bunk.

Here’s what he said today; it’s a paraphrase, but the key points are accurate:

The Honolulu rail project is costing each Oahu family $4,000 to $5,000 each year. He specifically said the rail project is costing Oahu families that much every year.

Do you know how much money you’d have to spend for the one-half-of-one-percent general excise tax to generate $5,000?

The on-air anti-railer wants you to believe something so preposterous, so wildly off the mark that it’s almost beyond comprehension – except for the fact that the campaign to discredit Honolulu’s fast, frequent, reliable and safe rail system of the future knows no bounds.

Do some back-of-the-envelope calculations here. According to online sources, the median household income for a family on Oahu in 2008 was about $70,000. (We don't have the numbers for the 2010 Census, but let's work with that figure.) Let's say $50,000 is left for expenditures after taxes and savings and that every red cent that's spent is subject to the rail GET tax.

The family's annual rail tax bill would be TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS -- 5 percent of the anti-railer's number!

Today’s radio show was more evidence that anything goes in the campaign against rail, even stuff snatched from thin air -- and the air is thin indeed five mornings a week.