The headlines are predictable. They scream about "relief" and "public welfare" after a massive hike in fuel prices. They paint a picture of a benevolent state stepping in to save the common man with free transport schemes. It is a lie. It is a desperate, short-sighted maneuver designed to buy political breathing room with money the country doesn't have.
When a government hikes petrol prices—the so-called "petrol bomb"—and then immediately pivots to offering free bus rides, they aren't solving a problem. They are shifting a burden. They are taking money out of your left pocket through inflation and debt, then dropping a nickel into your right pocket and asking for a thank you.
The Myth of the Free Lunch
Economists like Milton Friedman spent decades trying to hammer home a singular truth: there is no such thing as a free lunch. In Pakistan’s current fiscal reality, "free transport" is a hallucination.
Every liter of fuel used in those "free" buses is imported with dwindling foreign exchange reserves. Every driver’s salary is paid by a central bank that is currently grappling with a debt-to-GDP ratio that makes international lenders wince. When you make a service free, you remove the only mechanism that allows that service to sustain itself: revenue.
What happens next? The fleet degrades. The buses stop running because there is no budget for spare parts. The "relief" vanishes, leaving behind a gutted infrastructure and a larger deficit. We have seen this movie before. From the ruins of the Soviet Union’s price-controlled bread lines to the collapse of Venezuela’s subsidized energy sector, the result is always the same.
The Trumpian Optics of Desperation
The media is quick to draw parallels to Donald Trump’s populist messaging style—the direct, "I am the only one who can save you" rhetoric. But there is a fundamental difference between a wealthy superpower using stimulus and a struggling economy using subsidies.
In a robust economy, a populist message might be a branding choice. In an economy surviving on IMF life support, it is a mask for structural failure. By framing the subsidy as a personal gift to the citizens, the state avoids the hard conversation about why the energy sector is a black hole of circular debt.
The "thank you" requested from the public isn't just for a bus ride. It’s an ask for the public to ignore the fact that the currency has been devalued into oblivion. It is a psychological distraction from the $25 billion in external debt payments looming on the horizon.
Why High Prices are Actually the Solution
This is the part that makes people angry. High petrol prices are not the enemy; they are the signal.
Prices are the nervous system of an economy. When the price of fuel goes up, it reflects a global reality: energy is scarce, and the local currency is weak. By artificially suppressing the cost of transport for the masses, the government is cutting the nerves. They are telling the population to keep consuming as if the crisis isn't real.
If you want to fix Pakistan’s transport problem, you don't make it free. You make it efficient. You privatize the routes, allow for competition, and let the market find a price point that allows for the purchase of new, fuel-efficient vehicles.
Free transport kills innovation. No private entrepreneur will ever start a competing bus line if the state is giving away the product for nothing. The result? A state-run monopoly on mediocrity. You get crowded, dangerous, unreliable transport that costs the taxpayer triple what a private ticket would have cost.
The Hidden Tax of "Relief" Schemes
Let’s talk about where the money actually comes from. Since the government has a massive primary deficit, they can't pay for these buses out of a surplus. They have two choices:
- Print money: This leads to the very inflation that necessitated the "petrol bomb" in the first place.
- Borrow: Taking out high-interest loans to pay for daily operational expenses (like bus fuel) is the equivalent of paying your mortgage with a credit card.
Imagine a scenario where a small business owner sees their electricity bill double. Instead of cutting costs or improving efficiency, they decide to give away their product for free to keep the customers happy. How long does that business stay open? Not long. Yet, we applaud when a nation-state does the exact same thing on a million-fold scale.
The "relief" is a tax on your future. It is a tax on the value of the Rupee. Every "free" ride today is a 20% increase in the price of flour tomorrow.
The Logistics of Failure
Free public goods suffer from the "Tragedy of the Commons." When something is free, the incentive to maintain it or use it responsibly evaporates.
I have seen municipal transport authorities in developing nations collapse under the weight of these populist promises. Within eighteen months, the "free" buses are stripped for parts or sitting in a lot because the government realized they couldn't afford the mechanics. The poor, who were promised a lifeline, are left stranded when the program inevitably goes bankrupt.
True "pro-poor" policy would be targeting the infrastructure, not the price. Build the roads. Secure the supply chains. Deregulate the industry so that fifty different companies are fighting to give you the cheapest, most reliable ride. That is how you lower costs sustainably.
Stop Asking for Relief, Start Asking for Reform
The public is asking the wrong question. They are asking, "How will I afford to get to work tomorrow?"
The government’s answer is: "Here is a free ride today, don't look at the bill we're sending your children."
The real question should be: "Why is our energy infrastructure so inefficient that a global price fluctuation destroys our economy?"
Until the state stops playing the role of the benevolent provider and starts playing the role of the competent regulator, these cycles will continue. The "petrol bomb" isn't the price hike. The bomb is the debt being accumulated to pretend that the price hike doesn't matter.
Stop thanking the government for returning a fraction of the wealth they've devalued. A free bus ticket is a poor trade for a collapsing currency.
Burn the subsidies. Fix the markets. Stop lying to the people.
