ICYMI: America’s First Coast-to-Coast Railroad Would Cut Costs, Create Union Jobs, and Be Built With Private Capital
Institute for Policy Innovation President Tom Giovanetti is out with a new op-ed on why the Surface Transportation Board should approve the Union Pacific–Norfolk Southern merger: an estimated $3.5 billion a year in shipper savings, about 1,200 net new union jobs, and America's first single-line railroad from coast to coast.
Oh and polling shows it is overwhelmingly popular as well…
In case you missed it…
Bigness Is Not a Crime. Let Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern Merge
Real Clear Markets
Tom Giovanetti
10/6/26
On May 10, 1869, workers drove a golden spike at Promontory Summit, Utah, and the Union Pacific met the Central Pacific. For the first time, freight could cross the country by rail. More than 150 years later, shockingly it still can't do so on a single railroad.
Freight moving between the East and the West today has to change hands, usually in Chicago or another interchange point in the middle of the country. Those handoffs can add 24 to 48 hours, according to the companies. A railcar waiting in a yard earns nothing. The shipper pays for the inventory sitting inside it, and eventually so do the rest of us.
The proposed merger of Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern would fix that. It would create the first single-line railroad from coast to coast, and it would be built with private capital. ... Two companies are putting their own money at risk because they think they can serve customers better and earn a return doing it. That is the profit motive at work, and it has built more American infrastructure than any government program ever will.
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Diesel averaged more than $6.50 a gallon in late September, up nearly 74 percent from a year ago, according to the Energy Information Administration. Trucking companies are passing those costs along, and families see it at the grocery store.
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The companies estimate that shifting freight from long-haul trucking to the combined railroad would save shippers $3.5 billion annually. Faster, more dependable service gives shippers a real reason to choose trains, and trucking companies will have to compete harder for every load.
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A Guidant Polling & Strategy survey of 2,000 likely general election voters nationwide, conducted April 8 to 14, 2026, found that 55 percent supported the proposal after hearing a basic description. Twenty-three percent opposed it, and 22 percent were unsure. Support outpaced opposition by more than two to one.
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The poll likewise found that Americans see this merger as improving affordability, with that being the leading benefit respondents identified.
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The Surface Transportation Board has the job of reviewing this deal, and it should do that job thoroughly. Hold the companies to their commitments. But the board shouldn't load the approval with so many conditions that it strips out the efficiencies that make the merger worth doing. A slow-walked, hedged-to-death approval would leave shippers and families paying for the delay.
