No, and that is the most funny thing about how the government
tries to explain non-dublication and confuse the public.
If we were to base this on basic demand and supply principles, and
assume that all bus companies here are profit maximising entities,
then dublication will actually benefit consumers either way. When
two companies offer the same bys route, they still have to take
into account actual demand along it, which obviously dosent
neccesarily multiply by two with two routes. The demand is shared,
and they will have to adjust and reduce their frequencies if need
be in response.
If they were to do the uneconomical thing of offering an increase
in frequency despite low demand, and try to charge higher fares,
then a price war can result, with each companuy under-cutting the
other to gain more passengers. The result is that both comapnies
end up having to keep their prices low anyway. In some cases, they
might get into a cartel and both raises fares to the same level,
undermining the basics of open competition, and which I assume is
the main problem you are refering to. Of coz, both are only
possible provided there is no governmental intervention and the
like.
But of coz, I was refering to the current state of affairs here,
with governmental control over certain aspects such as pricing. It
almost always helps to have more then one route to take from point
A to B, which I assume most of us would have discovered in our
daily journeys.
