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Found the text version more compelling myself: https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme
I don't think there's any novel thinking here. They're just rebranding cyclic economics for dramatic effect.
NotJustBikes are doing some incredible work. It’s really time to reframe how we plan our cities and make the spaces we occupy designed for human scale engagement. I encourage anyone interested in this video to definitely check out more of their videos, so much valuable insight as to practically how our urban spaces could be incredible to live in.
Ponzi Scheme: a form of fraud in which belief in the success of a nonexistent enterprise is fostered by the payment of quick returns to the first investors from money invested by later investors.
The US system means you can live outside cities (and so avoid paying city taxes) and travel in to enjoy the amenities they provide. The result is a classic "failure of the commons" where contributors move out and people in need move in. The growth fallacy relies on cities already being short of cash, it is a symptom, not a disease.
The infrastructure cost for inefficient sprawled out areas is enormous. A money pit.
Found the text version more compelling myself: https://www.strongtowns.org/the-growth-ponzi-scheme
They make the argument that growth, in an of itself, is a "ponzi scheme". Whereas boom-bust economic cycles are nothing new, and are clearly not the same as a literal ponzi scheme. I don't think there's any novel thinking here. They're just rebranding cyclic economics for dramatic effect.
Can someone name an example of a city that has gone bankrupt due to infrastructure costs that didn't also lose a large amount of its population or lose key local industries?
Orange County, CA circa 1994. Bonds & securities shenanigans.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Citron#County_bankruptc...
Can someone name an example of a city that has gone bankrupt due to infrastructure costs that didn't also lose a large amount of its population or lose key local industries?
Can someone name an example of a city that has gone bankrupt due to infrastructure costs that didn't also lose a large amount of its population or lose key local industries?
Population shifts don’t just happen in an afternoon if a city can’t deal with a 10% population decline over a decade it was already in dire straits. Pensions for example are’t inherently an issue, it’s just a debt that should have been prepaid over the ~30 years these employees where working for the city.
Ponzi Scheme: a form of fraud in which belief in the success of a nonexistent enterprise is fostered by the payment of quick returns to the first investors from money invested by later investors.
We need a word that is not intentionally a fraud but is pretty much an example of an unsustainable pyramid.