Although I totally agree. The arguments here aren’t very well laid out. I feel like we got some thesis statements but no data to back anything up.
Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
41–50 of 296 posts
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
Museums aren't free to enter.
Many public ones are
And some non-public ones, like the Minneapolis Institute of Art https://new.artsmia.org/
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#43Needs to be made illegal (not just stadiums) http://www.governing.com/gov-institute/on-leadership/col-eco... or at least not federally subsidized https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/134... https://www.goodjobsfirst.org/ is a good general resource on the issue.
The voters have to achieve consensus that sports stadiums aren’t worth it first. Democracy doesn’t really have easy shortcuts, educating voters is hard but it has to be done. You can’t make something illegal if the majority of voters want it. Until voters stop wanting them publicly subsidized stadiums will continue to be built.
>Democracy doesn’t really have easy shortcuts
The easy shortcut is IQ and education cannot improve it.
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#44Needs to be made illegal (not just stadiums) http://www.governing.com/gov-institute/on-leadership/col-eco... or at least not federally subsidized https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/134... https://www.goodjobsfirst.org/ is a good general resource on the issue.
How would one propose to make it illegal for an elected government to finance construction of a public building? I mean, yeah, sports stadiums are wasteful. But how would you draft that such that it wouldn't eliminate libraries and museums? I mean, I agree with you in spirit but at the end of the day the whole point of a democratic government is that it's empowered to work to better our collective lives. And that has…
There’s a huge corpus of jurisprudence on this in the EU, where such funding is illegal:
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#45Although I completely agree about the general premise, it's borderline intellectually dishonest to include a link to your own web site as a reference (the "infrastructure" link). Just include the direct references to third parties, like in the footnote.
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#46[deleted]
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But how would you draft that such that it wouldn't eliminate libraries and museums Maybe we should. These days, public libraries are little more than homeless shelters. I haven't been to one in at least 5 years for that reason, and printed books are largely irrelevant in today's world anyway. Museums could be operated by private non-profits and foundations. No need to have taxpayers directly finance their construct…
Libraries provide dozens of services to those in low-income areas. Lots of people utilize the library for internet service.
As it turns out, homeless people can't easily keep laptops on them and afford to hang out at Starbucks all day. Public libraries give them and other low income people opportunities to develop skills and education, and electronic resources to find a long-term career that can take them out of poverty.
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How would one propose to make it illegal for an elected government to finance construction of a public building? State constitutional amendments requiring a referendum.
Well, sure. That works if these things are unpopular. They're not. That's the problem. Lost in the discussion of how many hundreds of million dollars St. Louis lost in its relationship with the Rams is the fact that the city loved that team and the stadium construction was a huge deal and a big political victory. The underlying flaw in the reasoning here is that it's all based on a personal feeling that "My governmen…
>> the city loved that team and the stadium construction was a huge deal and a big political victory
Can you quantify "the city loved"?
I'm sure the construction was "a huge deal", large construction projects almost always are.
Something professional politicians choose to support != something that a majority of voters would choose to support, given the chance.
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#49Art Modell, the owner of the Cleveland Browns, moved the team to Baltimore right after the taxpayers built them a new stadium. Even though these events happened in the mid-90's and Modell died in 2012, his name is still considered a curse word in Cleveland.
Re: Taxpayers Should Never Subsidize Stadiums
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
How would one propose to make it illegal for an elected government to finance construction of a public building? I mean, yeah, sports stadiums are wasteful. But how would you draft that such that it wouldn't eliminate libraries and museums? I mean, I agree with you in spirit but at the end of the day the whole point of a democratic government is that it's empowered to work to better our collective lives. And that has…
There’s a huge corpus of jurisprudence on this in the EU, where such funding is illegal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_aid_(European_Union)
Doesnt stop them giving land for free and supporting infrastructure though. Which can be a huge part of the cost. Aalianz Arena (munich) is a good example