@article{Prater:207270,
      recid = {207270},
      author = {Prater, Marvin and Casavant, Ken and Jessup, Eric and  Blanton, Bruce and Bahizi, Pierre and Nibarger, Daniel and  Weingram, Isaac},
      title = {Rail Competition Changes Since the Staggers Act},
      address = {2010-03},
      number = {1430-2016-118704},
      pages = {20},
      year = {2010},
      abstract = {Agricultural and other shippers are concerned about the  sufficiency in rural areas of transportation capacity, the  sufficiency of competition in the transportation system,  the reliability of transportation services, and the  reasonableness of rates. This paper explores these  questions with regard to the sufficiency of rail freight  competition.
The paper begins with a discussion of the  importance of rail transportation for U.S. agricultural  producers. Specific attention is paid to the nature of  competition faced by railroads, especially since  deregulation, using the analytical tool of inverse  Herfindahl-Hirschman Indices (HHI) by USDA Crop Reporting  Districts (CRD). As shown by the inverse HHIs, the overall  level of rail competition has generally decreased since the  1985-1992 period, even though rail competition has  increased for some CRDs. In addition, revenue to variable  cost ratios (R/VC) increased in most of the CRDs analyzed  and were related to the number of railroads competing in  the CRD.
Competition is then analyzed relative to the  revenue per ton as well as the revenue to variable cost  ratios (R/VC) associated with the level of competition for  six States with the least rail-to-rail competition, and  also distant from water transportation with those for four  States having more rail-to-rail competition and close  proximity to water transportation.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/207270},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.207270},
}