How about an “urban wealth fund”?
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How about an “urban wealth fund”?
1–10 of 43 posts
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#2[deleted]
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#3Better, IMO, is a relatively simple accounting change. Start charging rents for the real estate used by departments, and use the proceeds to fund those departments. It's a win-win: departments can more efficiently use their funding, and constituents get a better sense of the true costs of the services involved.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#4> Leasing space in subway stations to shops might detract from the “historic” character of the US’s barbarous public transit systems, but the revenues could fund needed improvements, such as ventilation, without the need for debt or higher passenger fares.
All the public transit systems I've rode in Europe and Asia have lots of infrastructure (especially stores) built into their train stations. I found them to be a welcome convenience rather than a distraction - and the many travelers in the stores indicates that others did too.
If private shops in the subway is the price we pay for efficient public transit, then please, may I have some more?
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#5> Leasing space in subway stations to shops might detract from the “historic” character of the US’s barbarous public transit systems, but the revenues could fund needed improvements, such as ventilation, without the need for debt or higher passenger fares. All the public transit systems I've rode in Europe and Asia have lots of infrastructure (especially stores) built into their train stations. I found them to be a w…
Makes sense to have some shops, a quick bite on the way through vs having to go look for a shop when you get topside. Lowering costs, improving the facilities, and providing those quick resources while on the move would help. People might lose some of their excuses and start using the public transport systems more. Which feeds the businesses, which pay for the upgrades. Becomes a self-feeding circle. I like.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#6This seems like a really bad idea for all sorts of perverse incentive reasons.
Primarily I'd guess related to the fact that the costs of running a city of a given size are basically entirely fixed costs, rather than being marginal. Especially when you add that most of the essential services a metro-area government provides are revenue negative.
Trying to make (for example) the health department "pay fair market rents" means you either have no health department or a drastically less effective one.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#7This seems like a really bad idea for all sorts of perverse incentive reasons. Primarily I'd guess related to the fact that the costs of running a city of a given size are basically entirely fixed costs, rather than being marginal. Especially when you add that most of the essential services a metro-area government provides are revenue negative. Trying to make (for example) the health department "pay fair market rents…
If the health department is not paying the actual price, someone else is paying the difference.
The department therefore does not get cheaper, it just looks cheaper on paper since the real costs are hidden. The reduced transparency is what stands in the way of creating democratic or market based decisions on the departments funding.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#8> ...and have the option to borrow against or sell their shares if desperate for cash.
Do you want to fast track privatization of all public infrastructure for pennies on the dollar? Because that is how you get it.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#9Could this be used to fund Universal Basic Income? A starter is looking at the wealth fund in Norway or citizen dividends in Alaska.
Re: How about an “urban wealth fund”?
#10Could this be used to fund Universal Basic Income? A starter is looking at the wealth fund in Norway or citizen dividends in Alaska.
Not really. Unless you get efficiency gains, all the income from the government charging itself rent gets eaten up as expenses for paying itself rent. Basically what it's doing is making imputed rent an explicit budget item, and then allowing financial ~stuff~ to be done with those budget items explicitly (say, letting a department save money by using real estate more efficiently).