We currently have two problems:
1: Inflation is rampant because the governments spent so much on fighting Covid.
2: Covid variants are still spreading.
What shall we do?
Let's spend more government money! On what? A free ticket, so people will cram into buses and trains together!
Also this particular spending is subsidized with a tax. This is income redistribution, not printing money.
Otherwise, it's just a re-allocation of money within a fixed budget. E.g. instead of money being allocated to building a new road it is allocated to subsidising train rides. The supply of money doesn't increase.
The point I was trying to make is that subsidising poor and middle-class by re-allocating resources is better than printing money to give stimulus checks.
Subsidising rich people increases asset prices, share prices and house prices, and affects us all
Also, as far as I understand, governments spending money doesn't necessarily cause inflation. Inflation was rampant between 1998 and 2006 too, while the Spanish government was selling ownership on arguably most of their national industries.
Reducing energy consumption should be a priority. If our energy consumption was 1/10th of what it currently is, all of a sudden all these inflation issues would be gone. Current inflation is a butterfly effect, caused primarily by the increase in energy costs.
This sort of policy, if implemented effectively, can help to mitigate high diesel prices. (Plausibly it won’t, by overcrowding the system to the point where it’s counterproductive.) It also helps to approach better pricing of externalities, since generally taking the train is more socially useful.
Covid is a problem, but, post-vaccination, it’s roughly as bad as flu, and the combination of flu and public transport is not really that much of a problem, from past experience.
and second thing is pollution is also local (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_heat_island)
Everybody in Spain had the opportunity to access free Covid vaccines several times yet. If denialists keep ignoring science, is very sad, but is their choice, they will die more often. Maybe they should reduce the risk and abstain to use the train. The rest of the people needs to move on and keep with their lives.
If we discuss the solution as not valid, we should pick the correct reason to do this. The goal is to reduce our gas/car dependency exceptionally and temporarily in some big cities. Is a dumb idea? Well, promoting public transport in the middle of an energetic crisis does not seem so dumb to me, but better ideas are always welcomed.
Those hoping to stop the spread of covid are at odds with those trying to cramp people together. Just like those in hollywood who speakout against gun culture while appearing and promoting firearm use in the entertainment they produce.
That sail has shipped many months ago