Why American cities are weirdly shaped • Hacker News Board

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#161

Post by stale2002 » Mon, Dec 24, 2018, 10:16 PM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #160

stale2002 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your original argument was about libertarianism and how cities are like landlords that compete against each other. That idea is ridiculous. This is not compatible with libertarianism, and is a bad analogy. This is because it is not even close to a free market. A free market would be one where people actually can truly purchase land and compete. But that's not possible. At the end of the day the land is not owned by y…

Private groups are just smaller. Cities are larger and have more things going on. I can go live in this building or that. I can go live in this city or that. Can I buy an apartment in a building and own it 100% without the building having any say? What if the building is a condo? I own the apartment, in a sense. I bought it. But I still have to abide by the rules of the building. Does this make apartment housing not…

Sure. A free market for this kind of stuff would be the ability to purchase land without anyone in the entire world being able to raise the rent on you, or take it away after the fact.

No matter if this "rent" is called taxes or not.

The entity that has the ability to take away your land, or raise the rents at any time, is the group that actually owns that land.

Governments deserve special criticism because they make what I laid out to be impossible. Disney world is not the party to blame for why people can't own land. That blame goes to the government.

It is because of this idea, that it is impossible to ever truly own land, that governments do deserve special criticism.

So yes, that is what is special/different between a private group and governments. If I discovered an island, owned by no one, or bought an island, governments would still be able to raise the rent on me, but Disney world wouldn't be able to.

The group that has the ability to raise rents on you is the true owner of whatever land you are on. And it is only governments that have that power, ultimately.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#162

Post by scarejunba » Mon, Dec 24, 2018, 11:20 PM UTC

xte wrote: post #153

scarejunba wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, how interesting. It looks like you mostly encountered social housing. Where did you stay and go?

Islington (live) to Fitzrovia (work), I see wood slabs covered with lean cement and moquette, buildings with only reinforced concrete directly painted or naked instead of proper well-finished plaster, panels and furnishings used as a quick way to cover unfinished/dirty things, moquette everywhere obviously dirty and crumpled... And no, they aren't social houses. Of course MANY countries, highly developed included, ha…

Interesting. I suppose I mostly lived in new build in by Tower Bridge and on the other side in Kensington. Solid homes all.

Or in older homes in the midlands and those were fine.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#163

Post by daveFNbuck » Mon, Dec 24, 2018, 11:45 PM UTC

masonic wrote: post #152

daveFNbuck wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live in California, the sales tax is different between cities. Leading up to July 4, fireworks are not legal to sell in every city, so you can tell city boundaries by where the booths selling them are set up. Which city you're in is also important if you want to set them off legally. Local laws and regulations also have much subtler effects that help shape which cities are desirable to live in, but those aren…

Where I live in California, the sales tax is different between cities. What city? Supplemental sales taxes vary by county in almost all circumstances. Generally, people can't really be sure what city they are in (if any) when away from home. Street address "city" has no legal meaning except for the convenience of the Post Office. A Saratoga address might actually be in Los Gatos, or vice-versa, or outside all city li…

I live in Redwood City, which in November passed a 0.5% city sales tax. It does look like you're currently right though. Going between cities only changed the sales tax because the cities I was going between were in different counties.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#164

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 1:21 AM UTC

masonic wrote: post #152

daveFNbuck wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live in California, the sales tax is different between cities. Leading up to July 4, fireworks are not legal to sell in every city, so you can tell city boundaries by where the booths selling them are set up. Which city you're in is also important if you want to set them off legally. Local laws and regulations also have much subtler effects that help shape which cities are desirable to live in, but those aren…

Where I live in California, the sales tax is different between cities. What city? Supplemental sales taxes vary by county in almost all circumstances. Generally, people can't really be sure what city they are in (if any) when away from home. Street address "city" has no legal meaning except for the convenience of the Post Office. A Saratoga address might actually be in Los Gatos, or vice-versa, or outside all city li…

> Supplemental sales taxes vary by county in almost all circumstances.

There are lots of cities in CA with supplemental sales tax; for a partial list, see [0] and note the table under “Cities with highest combined sales tax rates by county”, every listed entry that isn't “countywide” results from either a city or sub-county special district (or both) having a local supplemental sales tax, and the listing only includes the cities with the highest such taxes in each county.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sales_and_use_taxes_in_Calif...

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#165

Post by EGreg » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 1:35 AM UTC

stale2002 wrote: post #161

EGreg wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private groups are just smaller. Cities are larger and have more things going on. I can go live in this building or that. I can go live in this city or that. Can I buy an apartment in a building and own it 100% without the building having any say? What if the building is a condo? I own the apartment, in a sense. I bought it. But I still have to abide by the rules of the building. Does this make apartment housing not…

Sure. A free market for this kind of stuff would be the ability to purchase land without anyone in the entire world being able to raise the rent on you, or take it away after the fact. No matter if this "rent" is called taxes or not. The entity that has the ability to take away your land, or raise the rents at any time, is the group that actually owns that land. Governments deserve special criticism because they make…

Just tell me what is a free market exactly defined!

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#166

Post by masonic » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 3:27 AM UTC

daveFNbuck wrote: post #163

masonic wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I live in California, the sales tax is different between cities. What city? Supplemental sales taxes vary by county in almost all circumstances. Generally, people can't really be sure what city they are in (if any) when away from home. Street address "city" has no legal meaning except for the convenience of the Post Office. A Saratoga address might actually be in Los Gatos, or vice-versa, or outside all city li…

I live in Redwood City, which in November passed a 0.5% city sales tax. It does look like you're currently right though. Going between cities only changed the sales tax because the cities I was going between were in different counties.

  Redwood City, which in November passed a 0.5% city sales tax

... which hasn't taken effect yet.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#167

Post by stale2002 » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 4:08 AM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #165

stale2002 wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. A free market for this kind of stuff would be the ability to purchase land without anyone in the entire world being able to raise the rent on you, or take it away after the fact. No matter if this "rent" is called taxes or not. The entity that has the ability to take away your land, or raise the rents at any time, is the group that actually owns that land. Governments deserve special criticism because they make…

Just tell me what is a free market exactly defined!

I answered that question in literally my first paragraph.

A free market for this would be defined as when everyone has to ability to actually own land, without anyone else in the world being able to charge additional rent on it.

So you buy land, and you own it. And no one can decide to charge you more rent for this, would be the definition of a free market.

Governments do not have this property of being a free market because they can change their mind and charge you money for it later. Therefore they are the ones who own the land and it is not a free market.

A free market would be defined as when you owe zero rent to anyone in the world, no matter if the rent is called taxes or not, and you actually own the land.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#168

Post by jeffbax » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 4:53 AM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #38

mc32 wrote: post #9

The article implies that if cities could unilaterally annex twrritory they would and that presumanly would result in nicer city shapes (boundaries) as well as more importantly better and cheaper services due to elimination of redundancies. Interestingly the article claims both rich and poor people are reluctant to give up their enclaves/ independence due to power, momey, and other aspects such as education.

Suburban towns are more likely to be more lean and get by without things like large professional police and fire forces because they lack the social problems of the cities. The structure of city government is usually better defined and resistant to change, and would “win” over the annexed towns. Usually there’s a ward structure that benefits a certain type of political machinery. The backbone of suburban politics are…

Actually one of the latest episodes of the Impact is about how aggressively annexing ended up serving those within the city very poorly.

https://art19.com/shows/the-impact/episodes/99ffb9d5-58d6-44...

> The incredible shrinking city

> For decades, Memphis grew by bringing its suburbs into the city limits. City officials thought this suburb-gobbling policy would be an economic boon-- that it would bring in tax revenue.

> Instead, the policy was an economic disaster, especially for the majority black neighborhoods in the city's core. In this episode, we’ll tell you about the consequences of Memphis’ sprawl, and the city’s plan to fix its past mistakes.

This article should not be treating it like such a panacea, because it certainly went poorly for Memphis

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#169

Post by daveFNbuck » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 4:50 PM UTC

masonic wrote: post #166

daveFNbuck wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Redwood City, which in November passed a 0.5% city sales tax. It does look like you're currently right though. Going between cities only changed the sales tax because the cities I was going between were in different counties.

Redwood City, which in November passed a 0.5% city sales tax ... which hasn't taken effect yet.

That's why I said they were currently right.

Re: Why American cities are weirdly shaped

#170

Post by Spooky23 » Tue, Dec 25, 2018, 7:16 PM UTC

jeffbax wrote: post #168

Spooky23 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suburban towns are more likely to be more lean and get by without things like large professional police and fire forces because they lack the social problems of the cities. The structure of city government is usually better defined and resistant to change, and would “win” over the annexed towns. Usually there’s a ward structure that benefits a certain type of political machinery. The backbone of suburban politics are…

Actually one of the latest episodes of the Impact is about how aggressively annexing ended up serving those within the city very poorly. https://art19.com/shows/the-impact/episodes/99ffb9d5-58d6-44... > The incredible shrinking city > For decades, Memphis grew by bringing its suburbs into the city limits. City officials thought this suburb-gobbling policy would be an economic boon-- that it would bring in tax revenue…

Agreed. Like anything else in government or politics it depends on all sorts of things.

Even a place like NYC that did it’s annexing 100+ years ago feels the problems. When I was growing up in Queens, anyone we interfaced with in city government locally was a castoff banished to the provinces or a political idiot.

The consequences of that can be seen all over.