If you had money invested in the stock market in 2008, you lost a bundle.
If you had money invested in a savings account in 2008, the return was below 5 percent.
Corporate bankruptcies were numerous, and corporations reporting significant losses were even more numerous as the economic recession savaged sales, revenue and profits.
Then there were railroads.
The Surface Transportation Board on March 19 reported the following earnings for major railroads in 2008:
* For the Class I (or largest) railroads as a whole, their return on net investment was 11.2 percent in 2008, up from 10.1 percent in 2007.
* For Norfolk Southern, their return on net investment was 15.2 percent in 2008, up from 13.4 percent in 2007.
* For BNSF, their return on net investment was 11.1 percent in 2008, up from 10.5 percent in 2007.
* For Union Pacific, their return on net investment was 10.6 percent in 2008, up from 8.8 percent in 2007.
* For CSX, their return on net investment was 9.6 percent in 2008, up from 7.8 percent in 2007.
The STB report indicates that even as railroads were losing business because of the recession, they were raising rates because of their market power.
For 2008, Class I railroads increased their operating revenues to $61.2 billion, compared with $54.3 billion in 2007.
And Class I railroad profits -- net railway operating income -- rose a whopping 16 percent, to $9.2 billion in 2008 from $7.9 billion in 2007.
WASHINGTON - The number of train and engine service workers employed on Class I railroads dropped almost 7 percent the past year, reports Railway Age magazine.
This was far higher than the drop in overall rail employment.
U.S. Class I railroads employed 159,511 workers in mid-January 2009, 2.11 percent fewer than in mid-January 2008, according to Surface Transportation Board data used by Railway Age.
The biggest decline was in the transportation (train and engine) category, where employment was down 6.95 percent to 63,187.
The number of professional and administrative workers declined 0.35 percent to 13,753.
But the numbers improved in the four other categories, led by an 8.44 percent increase in transportation (other than train and engine) employment to 7,312.
The number of maintenance of way and structures employees increased 1.47 percent to 34,449; maintenance of equipment and stores employment rose 0.86 percent to 30,689; and the number of executives, officials, and staff assistants was up 0.03 percent to 10,121.
(This item appeared in Railway Age magazine March 19, 2009.)
