DISCUSSION.

Protective regulation assumes that the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) engages in so-called "umbrella" rate making; it sometimes arbitrarily raises the rates of one mode of transportation to aid another mode. According to a assumption motor carrier's rates are increased to protect a railroad. This assumption is untrue. Such rate making stands condemned in court and ICC decisions. The converse situation also is untrue: Complaints of carriers of one type that reductions proposed by carriers of another type are unlawful because they would cause the complaining carriers to lose traffic have been dismissed on many occasions as having no standing under the Act. Often an ideal solution, expressible in a single formula, is sought. Such a formula may emphasize direct costs. These costs necessarily are a much greater proportion of total motor than of total rail costs. Fixed costs, be they great or small, are as real, however, as any other to those who must strive to meet them and to justify further capital outlays.