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Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

cnn.com

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Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#21

Post by JumpCrisscross »

exitcode00 wrote: post #7
thaumasiotes wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Imagine if the project was given the 5 billion tax dollars handed to Jeff Bezos instead of a measly 4.5 million... The $4.5 million is money New York has to spend out of revenue. Spending it lowers the amount of money New York has. Neither of those is true of $5 billion in tax incentives. Look at the cash flow.

Who cares where it comes from. Tax payers are out 5 billion does it matter how?

> Who cares where it comes from

The city gave away $5 billion in tax breaks to ensure billions more in tax revenues. The deal was tax-positive. What those extra billions get spent on is up to us.

The Amazon thing is a massive red herring. Yes, it’s distasteful. But it’s also tiny. Giant political deals are being struck in Albany right now—Amazon is a distraction.

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#23

Post by autokad »

exitcode00 wrote: post #17
abtinf wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the point of the gp is that the money isn’t coming from anywhere. No one is out $5B. There is no budget line item you could point to that identifies the expenditure “$5B for Bezos”.

It's all semantics - I don't understand why people want to defend a multi-billion dollar corporation, but, lets say, that NYC didn't write off 5 billion to Amazon. Could the city have budgeted more for the failing subway and nasty harbor given that they received more in taxes? Maybe.. if they really cared for the city. All these corporations do with their profits and tax-incentives is hoard them overseas and spend th…

> "lets say, that NYC didn't write off 5 billion to Amazon. Could the city have budgeted more for the failing subway and nasty harbor given that they received more in taxes? Maybe"

You do realize NYC is not collecting less taxes because Amazon came? If Amazon goes to another city, they collect 0. if Amazon gets a tax break, they collect 0. now you could argue that Amazon provides some sort of extra burden on city resources, though they would also collect more taxes from the employees and other services rendered.

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#24

Post by ricardobeat »

exitcode00 wrote: post #17
abtinf wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe the point of the gp is that the money isn’t coming from anywhere. No one is out $5B. There is no budget line item you could point to that identifies the expenditure “$5B for Bezos”.

It's all semantics - I don't understand why people want to defend a multi-billion dollar corporation, but, lets say, that NYC didn't write off 5 billion to Amazon. Could the city have budgeted more for the failing subway and nasty harbor given that they received more in taxes? Maybe.. if they really cared for the city. All these corporations do with their profits and tax-incentives is hoard them overseas and spend th…

It’s not semantics. The tax write-off comes from new tax revenue. You simply do not have it otherwise. It is not taken off an existing budget.

Argue as much as you want about corporate motives (and I agree with you on incentives being not ideal, even though Amazon doesn’t “do” profits), it has no bearing on how tax write-offs work.

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#25

Post by onetimemanytime »

yursky wrote: post #18

https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/oyster-tecture/ is an excellent podcast about this project. It summarizes the history of the ecosystem and the intent behind the project very well. It's amazing how much of an oyster mecca new york used to be...

I hope this is as simple as adding oysters...

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#27

Post by throw564d »

ericdykstra wrote: post #16
ako wrote: post #5

We should all be freaking out about what we’ve done to the earth, but nobody seems to really be able to compare it within historical context. We just dont know what it was like just a century ago. I’m always surprised by facts like in this story and similar like https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2014/02/05/257046530/b... And https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/nyregion/new-york-city-sm...

Sometimes I think our only options going forward are a world where all natural habitat has been completely decimated, or an eco-fascist regime enforces pollution (and thus effectively population) control on the whole planet.

This seems to me one topic where HN has its head jammed firmly in the sand - population control goes against its dogma, yet unrestrained fertility will likely destroy the planet but hey, we had 50% female engineers for 2 weeks before the polar caps melted!

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#28

Post by kakaorka »

ericdykstra wrote: post #16
ako wrote: post #5

We should all be freaking out about what we’ve done to the earth, but nobody seems to really be able to compare it within historical context. We just dont know what it was like just a century ago. I’m always surprised by facts like in this story and similar like https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2014/02/05/257046530/b... And https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/nyregion/new-york-city-sm...

Sometimes I think our only options going forward are a world where all natural habitat has been completely decimated, or an eco-fascist regime enforces pollution (and thus effectively population) control on the whole planet.

I think you should watch the Handmaid’s Tale; it will make you never suggest your latter suggestion again :)

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#29

Post by gonesilent »

darkpuma wrote: post #6
cgb223 wrote: post #4

So uh, how edible will these billion oysters be considering the crap they’re filtering out of the river..?

There is a profit motive for those involved to underplay the toxicity of these oysters.

Whats in the clam chowder?....fish

Re: Cleaning New York's harbor with one billion oysters

#30

Post by benj111 »

kakaorka wrote: post #28
ericdykstra wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes I think our only options going forward are a world where all natural habitat has been completely decimated, or an eco-fascist regime enforces pollution (and thus effectively population) control on the whole planet.

I think you should watch the Handmaid’s Tale; it will make you never suggest your latter suggestion again :)

It was a book originally.

Plus that's kind of the opposite of what you're talking about, as most of the women are infertile.

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