More than a decade removed from the “Snowpocalypse” winter of 2015 that revealed massive problems at the MBTA, the T remains the region’s favorite punching bag.

Service has improved since then, and the agency is mostly back in good graces with federal overseers after earning a string of safety demerits. At the same time, the T’s spending has boomed, growing more than 60 percent over the past decade.

But is that simply the cost of operating a top-notch transit system in a post-pandemic world? Or has Beacon Hill been hypnotized into accepting poor budget management at the MBTA?

This week on The Codcast, our guests debate that question and more. CommonWealth Beacon senior reporter Chris Lisinski moderates a discussion between Jim Aloisi, a veteran transit advocate who served as transportation secretary to Gov. Deval Patrick, and Charlie Chieppo, a senior fellow at the Pioneer Institute who has repeatedly called for stricter control of the T’s spending.

Aloisi contended that trimming the MBTA’s budget would amount to a form of “amnesia” after a period of deferred maintenance and a much smaller T workforce fueled a safety crisis and federal scrutiny.

“In the 21st century, you’ve got to pay people relatively decent wages, particularly in a system like ours and a region like ours, which has a relatively high cost of living, to keep and retain people,” Aloisi said.

Chieppo agreed with Aloisi on many points, but landed at a different conclusion. Transit may be a public good, he said, but “that isn’t a blank check.”

The T could still keep its service and reliability improvements while saving money if officials took a different approach to pensions or privatized some of its work around logistics, Chieppo argued.

“We all know if we spend any time around the T the layers of administrative fat at the T that don’t have anything to do with delivering service,” he said.

In this episode, Aloisi and Chieppo discuss the MBTA’s growing workforce (10:10), whether the heavy reliance on the surtax fulfills voter expectations (25:30), and what a revived fiscal oversight board might do differently than the current MBTA board (37:30).