Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
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Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
1–10 of 172 posts
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#2Interesting 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 just pay more taxes. But "paying more taxes" seems to be antithetical to most Americans.
It's like the American Dream has just become "having nice things and not paying for them".
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#3Interesting 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 the UC system. Given my description of her, you know the answer: Of course not! We're overtaxed!
Most people are too stupid to understand that if we want nice things, we have to collectively pay for them. Though to be fair, there's plenty of politicians (see Republicans in Kansas, Louisiana, etc) telling people what they want to hear: tax cuts pay for themselves...
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#4Interesting 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…
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?
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#5site seems down for me, use google cache:
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:FtW484i...
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#6Earlier 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?
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.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#7Earlier 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?
I don't think people really understand where the money is going. I just looked at the numbers in the article, and I'm shocked that the upkeep of a little stretch of road in front of your house costs almost a thousand dollars a year. We just get used to that stuff being around and forget it costs money.
People think that way about all infrastructure, actually. "They want to raise water rates? What for?! We already pay $36/month!" Nobody thinks about the cost of digging up streets, replacing worn pipes, upgrading treatment plants, etc.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#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]):
* Zoning
* Setbacks
* Minimum parking requirements
* Minimum lot sizes
* Maximum units per lot
* Minimum road widths
[1] http://digitalcommons.tourolaw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?artic...
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#9There's this assumption that are $15-$18 per square foot. I'm no expert here, but I think that number might be roughly double what cities actually pay, based on this document from the State of Michigan : https://www.michigan.gov/documents/Vol2-40UIP16SubDevCosts-Y...
It's a decade old, but I'm seeing only $8/square foot cost, not $15+. Using the rest of the authors map + numbers, the majority of properties are now actually covering their street costs, with some room to spare for extras (such as curbs, sewers, sidewalks, etc, which suburban sprawl-type streets typically don't have).
Of course, Michigan roads are infamous for being terrible -- this might be the reason.
It might also be worth considering that a lot of high-end sprawl costs the city nothing in maintenance for their roads, since they are privately paved / plowed / maintained by HOAs.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#10First 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…
Very pertinent previous HN discussion about the difference between Japanese and US zoning: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8540845