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Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

mapstoryblog.thenittygritty.org

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Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#11

Post by akchin »

x0x0 wrote: post #3
mfoy_ wrote: post #2

Interesting article, and great visuals. The Sankey Diagram of the budget was very nice and of course all the interactive maps bear mentioning. I think that anecdote about the "free" parking structure was really telling. The federal government swooped in and built a bunch of parking space then left the lesser governments squabbling over whose responsibility it wasn't. More importantly, I think the best solution is to…

I have to share one of my favorite anecdotes. CA colleges are, for a number of reasons (prop 13, etc), in perpetual budget crises. A mother with a daughter in a UC was interviewed on tv whining about the impact of budget cuts on her daughter's education. After about a minute of this moron whinging, the reporter asked if she would be willing to pay a couple hundred dollars per year more in tax if it were dedicated to…

This might be unpopular, but California is a great example of a place where taxes are high, but it is not spent well. I remember looking at this a few years back, and although the state claims that 2/3 of state tax dollars goes towards education, a lot of it is supporting pensions and benefits of previous generation employees and teachers. While this is admirable, it essentially takes money away from today's generation for unsustainable promises made by unions and political leaders in the 80s and 90s. CA already has one of the highest marginal tax rates in the US of 9.5%, so it is understandable the woman does not want to pay more.

For schooling, Prop 13 is an even bigger issue. Even though property taxes are high for new buyers, schools are underfunded. Parents essentially are paying higher taxes in the form of fundraising to support science and other enrichment classes, which cannot be supported by the state. There were somewhat noble ideas behind Prop 13, but essentially what we have in California, is that newer residents of Californa bear a disproportionate amount of the burden.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#13

Post by rayiner »

clarkmoody wrote: post #8

First and foremost, we need to abolish the laws that caused this all to happen. Yes, that’s right – all of this was required to happen, by law. Many people think that sprawl is a free market phenomenon, and they are exactly wrong. Sprawl is caused by the following policies – I call these Sprawl Laws; you can find them for yourself in your local city code (for the most succinct explanation, see this paper[1]): * Zonin…

It's interesting that some of the most charming neighborhoods in the country (e.g. Chelsea in New York, DuPont in D.C.) were built before all that crap. You'd never build a "modern city" like Philadelphia, with its narrow one-way streets, lack of parking, and commercial and retail mish-mashed together. But most of the rest of the country feels dead in comparison.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#14

Post by bagels »

I don't know why the author only does an analysis of just property taxes contributing to road maintenance.

Most people in the US are contributing additional taxes in the form of:

* Gasoline taxes

* State and local sales taxes

* State and federal income taxes

Those taxes are available to build and maintain infrastructure as well. Whether they are [used for that purpose] or not is a different question.

I know that I am contributing more than enough taxes to maintain the small patch of road in front of where I live by the author's cost analysis.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#15

Post by rbritton »

mfoy_ wrote: post #4
x0x0 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to share one of my favorite anecdotes. CA colleges are, for a number of reasons (prop 13, etc), in perpetual budget crises. A mother with a daughter in a UC was interviewed on tv whining about the impact of budget cuts on her daughter's education. After about a minute of this moron whinging, the reporter asked if she would be willing to pay a couple hundred dollars per year more in tax if it were dedicated to…

I'm not surprised at all that people would hold such contradictory views, simultaneously demanding tax cuts and service improvements, but it is surprising that someone could utter them in the same breath and keep a straight face. Maybe it's just a lack of self awareness?

For some I'm sure it is, but I believe there's another facet to it: waste. A lot of tax revenue is totally wasted, and while some is almost certainly inevitable in an organization as large as the government, I strongly feel that no taxes should be raised or imposed until all reasonable avenues of reducing that have been pursued. For example, this should not be a thing: http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d08333.pdf

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#16

Post by jsprogrammer »

The analysis seems to include the material and labor costs of building the street. Most peoples' street was already built by the time it became theirs, so, of course their taxes didn't pay for any of the substantial costs that were previously laid out.

Moreover, looking at only a single year's budget would not represent the years with large expenditures on streets, or take into account increased, future amortized payments to cover costs.

Ultimately, we can know that this particular article is invalid because it is representing "long-term costs estimated by unnamed civil engineer as a global average" as "the actual costs of the streets in my city", and "the actual costs of the streets in my city" for "all my city wants to bill me for my streets, even though they actually cost a lot more".

Further, the article never explains who actually paid the costs, nor how this all relates to a claimed Growth Ponzi Scheme, or even evidence of property taxes halving...ever.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#17

Post by emodendroket »

clarkmoody wrote: post #8

First and foremost, we need to abolish the laws that caused this all to happen. Yes, that’s right – all of this was required to happen, by law. Many people think that sprawl is a free market phenomenon, and they are exactly wrong. Sprawl is caused by the following policies – I call these Sprawl Laws; you can find them for yourself in your local city code (for the most succinct explanation, see this paper[1]): * Zonin…

If that's what it takes I vote for the tax increase

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#18

Post by Zikes »

beberlei wrote: post #6
mfoy_ wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not surprised at all that people would hold such contradictory views, simultaneously demanding tax cuts and service improvements, but it is surprising that someone could utter them in the same breath and keep a straight face. Maybe it's just a lack of self awareness?

any government budget is just too big to get any feeling for this imho. And you can either always argue that its just spend on the wrong things, like military, espionage, social security or that others are not paying enough, like Apple only paying very little taxes because they hoard their money abroad.

Yep, budget mismanagement and being underfunded are completely separate things. It's entirely possible that the "moron" woman interviewed believed that the budget was plenty, but being negligently mis-spent.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#19

Post by smegger001 »

mfoy_ wrote: post #4
x0x0 wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to share one of my favorite anecdotes. CA colleges are, for a number of reasons (prop 13, etc), in perpetual budget crises. A mother with a daughter in a UC was interviewed on tv whining about the impact of budget cuts on her daughter's education. After about a minute of this moron whinging, the reporter asked if she would be willing to pay a couple hundred dollars per year more in tax if it were dedicated to…

I'm not surprised at all that people would hold such contradictory views, simultaneously demanding tax cuts and service improvements, but it is surprising that someone could utter them in the same breath and keep a straight face. Maybe it's just a lack of self awareness?

Or is it knowledge that most of the cost are going to growing administrative costs and bureaucracies and not to actually provide the services they are their ostensibly to provide. It reminded me of when my home towns school district had budget cuts no one in the administrative side was let go but a dozen or so teachers where laid off. services are cut but administive side stay the same or grow.

Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?

#20

Post by emodendroket »

bagels wrote: post #14

I don't know why the author only does an analysis of just property taxes contributing to road maintenance. Most people in the US are contributing additional taxes in the form of: * Gasoline taxes * State and local sales taxes * State and federal income taxes Those taxes are available to build and maintain infrastructure as well. Whether they are [used for that purpose] or not is a different question. I know that I am…

I don't know what other towns or states look like but from what I can see all those sources are already stretched pretty thin.
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