Note 645 — VIII CONCLUSION
Reading edition
"Though all the rates must be so fixed as to pay all the expenses both of construction and working, separate rates cannot be fixed according to cost of individual service or even according to the average cost of services to traffic in the same group. For in the first place the cost of the service cannot be ascertained. And secondly, if it could be ascertained, it would be of no use as a standard. To charge the average cost would be to drive away a large portion of the traffic and so increase almost proportionately the average cost of the remainder. This increase would then drive away a fresh portion, and so once more increase proportionately the cost to that still remaining. And so on."—W. M. Acworth, "The Theory of Railway Rates," Economic Journal, London, 1897, p. 324.