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Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

washingtonpost.com

391–400 of 455 posts

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They aren't forcing subsidized parking. They're forcing the construction of parking lots and structures. As for public interest. The idea is that without regulation, new apartments and condos would choose not build parking pushing their residents to park on the street. This causes congestion (cars circling trying to find parking) and makes going to these areas less pleasant. And I'm sure some would say these regulati…

Then just enforce the existing rules against parking on the street! This is not difficult. Indeed, it's easier than trying to centrally plan out exactly how much parking each house and business needs.

What rules against parking on the street? In many existing neighborhoods, houses don't have garages and rely exclusively on street parking. Should we disallow street parking and start making people rent garages? That would definitely affect the poor.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#392
post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the reasons I love having a car is storage. I can go chain-shopping and store items I bought in the car. Getting a random self-driving car would make me carry all the stuff I bought with me. Kinda sucks. Same with commuting or going to mass events. I keep some drinking water (fuck stadium/concerts pricing) in my car. I keep some gloves in case weather is colder than expected and to make sure I didn't accidenta…

You would still be able to go chain-hopping with a self-driving car, you would just be paying to keep it engaged the entire time, rather than getting a separate car for each hop and only paying while you're actually in it. As for everything else, I totally get that not being able to keep stuff in your car is inconvenient. But there are billions of people out there who don't own cars who already deal with these issues…

I totally get you and I'm not saying that car sharing doesn't work. We already got taxis and shared cars that we drive ourselves.

Some people seem to be very hyped up by autonomous driving and think that most people would jump on that bandwagon. I'm giving perspective that a big chunk of population have reasons to buy their own cars. It'll definitely boil down to price of the service. Would I drop convenience of having my own car for 80% car budget saving? Yep. 10%? Meh.. 50%? Maybe.

The "substantial costs of car ownership" depend on car. If you want to have (almost) new car, then yes, that's expensive. But after the car is paid off (or you just buy used with cash), car ownership isn't that expensive. Car sharing seems cheap compared to new(ish) car only. It's worth to own new(ish) car if you drive a lot and/or car must be available immediately 24/7. But car sharing service won't cut it for you then. Or if car is more than a mean of transportation. Car sharing won't fit the bill either. Unless autonomous car sharing would be few times cheaper than current car sharing. Even including all the junk miles.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#393
post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"people do find it desirable" Americans are culturally completely blind to narrowcasting, in this case narrowcasted beliefs about lifestyle. For example, millions of people are rabid extreme fans of the TV show "Survivor". Its economically important. Its culturally and socially relevant (well, to its super fans who insist on seeing life thru a "Survivor" lens). Enormous sums of money change hands over this one TV sho…

I did not advocate for everyone living in cities. I advocated for more city housing, as currently it is unaffordable to many who do want to live in them due to demand outstripping supply. If you want to see my view as Pol Pot style authoritanrianism, well, I'm not even sure where to start. We need more city housing because there's plenty of demand. I understand plenty of people want to live in rural areas, and I wish…

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Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#394
post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You pay for the cost of government elementary schools even if you homeschool your kids and you receive the benefit of living in a society where most people have a minimum level of education. You can then hire these people and not have to pay to teach them how to read. > You also pay for the cost of public parks even if you never use them Maybe you personally somehow never enjoy seeing nature, I don't know. You stil…

In this case, people without cars benefit from parking lots at stores, because store wouldn't be able to stay open if they only catered to people without cars. You still enjoy the benefit of a society where people get to choose their transportation and more be productive, rather than everyone living in a bleak grey dystopian city where everyone is riding the bus and can't control when or where they want to travel.

But the article doesn't argue for NO parking lots; it argues that FREE parking lots are the issue. The stores could stay open with paid parking, and could lower costs for non-drivers because they no longer needed to subsidize that free parking by charging everyone more.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then just enforce the existing rules against parking on the street! This is not difficult. Indeed, it's easier than trying to centrally plan out exactly how much parking each house and business needs.

What rules against parking on the street? In many existing neighborhoods, houses don't have garages and rely exclusively on street parking. Should we disallow street parking and start making people rent garages? That would definitely affect the poor.

Well, there's a number of solutions. You can tie the properties to particular street locations, like immediately in front of their house. You can give parking permits to local residents, and disallow visitor parking in some or all areas. You can turn it into metered parking, for which local residents are reimbursed some or all of their costs (or from which they receive a share of the local parking fees.) You could even turn it into neighbourhood-owned "parking co-ops" where neighbours in an area determine the price and can trade shares in the co-op.

I mean, there's a large, obvious middle ground of solutions in between "nobody can park on the street ever" and "anybody can park on the street for free at any time". There are many options; you can ration it by price, by local ownership, or some other mechanism, quite easily. Indeed, almost everywhere in the city I live in where people rely on street parking, there's a resident-permit system. So, in effect, when people buy houses on that street, they're paying to buy a "share" of its parking too.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#396
post #387
post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you've missed the point of the article. People who don't use public transportation subsidize those who do, but we're OK with that as a society in large part because many need to use public transportation; the young, the disabled, anyone who can't afford a car and or to live next to their work and a grocery store. Similarly, we subsidize schooling and school lunches. But subsidizing parking is the opposite of…

No, you're doing EXACTLY what I was calling out. You've got your own ethical / utility function and are explaining to me that basket of goods X is ideal bc it's exactly the basket that your ethical / utilitarian code wants, and basket Y is very bad, because it's the basket that other people want. This is special pleading.

I find your argument utterly bizarre. You're saying "these are all members of a category, therefore you must accept ALL of them or NONE of them". But your choice of category is arbitrary! Why make it "currently executed subsidies" instead of "all possible subsidies" instead of "subsidies that were done in ancient Sumeria" instead of "subsidies that primarily aid those less well off"? I have no problem doing what you're calling out because what you're calling out is reality. You're proving far too much.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#397
post #245

Meh. You also pay for the cost of public parks even if you never use them. You pay for the cost of government elementary schools even if you homeschool your kids. etc. Now, I'm an anarchocapitalist and would love to see all of these costs unbundled, so that we each pay only for what we use. ...but the other 99.9% of folks in our society think that it is reasonable to have one-size-fits-all solutions, where a single b…

Yes, we do each of those things because we want to strongly encourage their use. The unfairness is supposed to be outweighed by the social benefits to all by this encouragement. This is a good thing IF we think it's a good thing for people to:

- Go to parks more, and be more relaxed and healthy, benefiting everyone

- Get more education more, benefiting all of society

- Drive more.... thus creating more traffic, accidents, and pollution??

One of these things is not like the other!

At the very least, if you want to encourage people travelling (for some reason, not clear what the benefit is) you should be fair and equally subsidize car usage, transit usage, and bike/walk usage. (In much of the USA, parking is free, usage of most freeways is free, but trains and buses cost money and bike/walking is made difficult. The only conclusion to draw is that government wants to encourage usage of cars instead of non-car transport mediums, for unfathomable reasons)

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#398
post #255
post #245

Meh. You also pay for the cost of public parks even if you never use them. You pay for the cost of government elementary schools even if you homeschool your kids. etc. Now, I'm an anarchocapitalist and would love to see all of these costs unbundled, so that we each pay only for what we use. ...but the other 99.9% of folks in our society think that it is reasonable to have one-size-fits-all solutions, where a single b…

>Now, I'm an anarchocapitalist and would love to see all of these costs unbundled, so that we each pay only for what we use. Anarchocapitalism isn't anarchistic, as capitalism necessarily entails the establishment of at least two classes: the proletariat and bourgeoisie, defined in terms of the relationship to the means of production. https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/daibhidh-anarcho-huc...

>Blah blah blah, only my definitions are allowable.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#399
post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Now, I'm an anarchocapitalist and would love to see all of these costs unbundled, so that we each pay only for what we use. Anarchocapitalism isn't anarchistic, as capitalism necessarily entails the establishment of at least two classes: the proletariat and bourgeoisie, defined in terms of the relationship to the means of production. https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/daibhidh-anarcho-huc...

That seems unrelated to the discussion. If GP had said, "I'm a blueberry muffin and would love to see all of these costs unbundled...", could you have responded differently?

I was picking up on a point or what I saw as a contradiction or misunderstanding. I see no problem with doing this. It is true that I was not directly attacking or agreeing with his or her position, but I do not see why I must do so when commenting. Ironically in the spirit of libertarianism, feel free to ignore my comment if you find it annoying or off-point.

Re: Poor people pay for parking even when they can’t afford a car

#400
post #245

Meh. You also pay for the cost of public parks even if you never use them. You pay for the cost of government elementary schools even if you homeschool your kids. etc. Now, I'm an anarchocapitalist and would love to see all of these costs unbundled, so that we each pay only for what we use. ...but the other 99.9% of folks in our society think that it is reasonable to have one-size-fits-all solutions, where a single b…

Yes, we do each of those things because we want to strongly encourage their use. The unfairness is supposed to be outweighed by the social benefits to all by this encouragement. This is a good thing IF we think it's a good thing for people to: - Go to parks more, and be more relaxed and healthy, benefiting everyone - Get more education more, benefiting all of society - Drive more.... thus creating more traffic, accid…

Somehow I doubt your support of home schools. Even though the students perform better.
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