The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain • Hacker News Board

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#331

Post by DamnYuppie » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 9:53 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #230

Jorge1o1 wrote: post #31

The streets were never free. We paid for it with our tax money. (Not to mention our 22 trillion dollar public debt) I don’t think people expect streets to be free in the same way you don’t expect the police department to be free, the fire department to be free, public schools, etc. In any case, my point is, we paid for the streets with our tax money and our debt, so don’t masquerade this as some kind of “economic rec…

As a Manhattan resident, I'm paying a LOT of my tax money for the streets. And I barely get to use them, because like the majority of my fellow Manhattanites, I don't own a car. If the public space were reconfigured to accurately reflect the taxpayer makeup, then you would see a lot less space dedicated to cars and a lot more dedicated to pedestrians, mass transit, and non-automobile transportation options like bicyc…

You do realize that most of the streets in Manhattan were laid down well in advance of the rise of automobiles. In fact they were laid out when carriage and pedestrian traffic were the only options! I believe this map is from 1821!

https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3804n.ct001389/

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#332

Post by AnthonyMouse » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 9:57 PM UTC

imgabe wrote: post #320

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Where do you think there is more competition among coffee shops The comparison isn't between coffee shops in Manhattan and coffee shops in the suburbs, it's between coffee shops within ten minutes of your office in Manhattan as measured at a walking pace compared to the speed of a motorized vehicle. > Nobody. I mean, not one single person, who works in Manhattan below Central Park is currently traveling 3 miles any…

> If you make $50,000, the various governments take $5000 or more of the top $10,000 in taxes and benefits phase outs. So if you made $40,000 instead, you wouldn't have $10,000 less money, you would have $5000 less money because you would also pay $5000 less in taxes. If keeping the $50,000 job also costs you $5000 in congestion charges, the job that "pays more" no longer does. > The taxes on the extra $10,000 don't…

> People making $50k per year are not in the 50% marginal tax bracket.

You're not counting state and local taxes and benefits phase outs. The benefits phase outs are a bear -- for low and middle income people they often exceed the taxes.

> I would be willing to wager there is almost nobody making $50k who drives to work in lower Manhattan by themselves.

To wear a suit and work in an office? No, probably not. But many service workers don't get paid very well and nonetheless work in Manhattan. And it's hard for people making that amount of money to afford to live in Manhattan either -- because there isn't enough housing there.

> They would already be priced out by the current tolls and parking.

This is why the current tolls are also bad. (And Uber and Lyft have got a solution for the parking.)

But what about the principle is dependent on the income level to begin with? It's just an example. Isn't it also bad to force out the person making $70,000 who then takes another job somewhere else for $60,000?

How is congestion pricing better than building enough housing in the city that everyone who works there can afford to live there instead of having to commute in?

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#333

Post by kadendogthing » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 9:57 PM UTC

maxsilver wrote: post #307

kadendogthing wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, what? Why does having less cars create less usable land? If anything it provides way more of it, since you need less road, less parking lots/garages, less infrastructure to support cars like gas stations, huge on/off ramps, toll roads, etc.

> Why does having less cars create less usable land? Not "usable-as-in-present", but "usable-as-in-available". Having less cars drives up the value of land, making land more expensive for everyone, and making that land less usable for any one person specifically.

>Having less cars drives up the value of land, making land more expensive for everyone

You just repeated what he said... while also repeating it again. I want to know how having less cars drives up the value of land.

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#334

Post by yonran » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 10:23 PM UTC

FakeComments wrote: post #327

yonran wrote: post #195

I think Emily Badger sort of misses the point. A scarcity tax is completely different from a user benefit fee for road maintenance. For public goods, it’s a good thing for the government to subsidize the fixed costs of the public good. But where there is traffic, the road is not entirely a public good anymore and we are already paying the cost of congestion, but the price is in the form of time and inconvenience rath…

This assumes that either: 1. People can arbitrarily convert time into money, ie, there’s not a reason they’d prefer to pay some expenses in time. 2. People are free to change their travel times, and aren’t being coerced into traveling at a particular time. If travel time is a monopsony, then this is mere rent extraction because people can’t adjust behavior in response to economic pressures.

Yes, and in my opinion those are both valid assumptions to make.

1. You’re right, congestion pricing forces drivers to reveal the marginal price for time. In a congested road, what makes the marginal driver decide not to drive at a specific time? Because he knows that it will take too much time due to traffic (or because he is simply forced to queue). In a toll road, what makes the marginal driver decide not to drive at a given time? Because he knows it will cost too much money. At the margin, congestion pricing turns a time cost into a monetary cost.

For those individuals whose value of time is lower than the marginal driver (i.e., people who would rather have a traffic jam than pay the toll), congestion pricing itself can make them worse off, but when the proceeds are reinvested in transit I think it’s probable that congestion pricing will generally benefit lower-income people.

2. Congested roads already force people to change their travel time. If you try to cross a congested bridge at a specific time, you will be queued until all the people in front of you have passed. So I suppose you could say the road already is extracting rent and throwing it away. Congestion pricing harnesses the value (of all the drivers whose value of time is above the marginal driver) instead of discarding it.

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#335

Post by akgerber » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 10:53 PM UTC

Jorge1o1 wrote: post #31

The streets were never free. We paid for it with our tax money. (Not to mention our 22 trillion dollar public debt) I don’t think people expect streets to be free in the same way you don’t expect the police department to be free, the fire department to be free, public schools, etc. In any case, my point is, we paid for the streets with our tax money and our debt, so don’t masquerade this as some kind of “economic rec…

The majority of New Yorkers don't own cars, yet the vast majority of NYC road space (and maintenance expense) is dedicated to the small number of people who drive in Manhattan, making the city more dangerous, noisier, and more polluted for the non-driving majority. Without congestion pricing, the non-driving majority is subsidizing those who choose to make Manhattan a worse place to be by driving in it!

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#336

Post by akgerber » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 10:56 PM UTC

astine wrote: post #286

akira2501 wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> where the people are FINALLY going to have to pay for those roads the government’s been giving away for free for so long. The article also makes the annoying case that there are those who live in apartments and dwellings that have to pay for parking by code, but don't use that parking because they don't drive; however, this entirely fails to take into account the effect on the city as a whole. Parking and road acce…

"While these people may not drive and thus are seemingly cheated out of tax money, I have to ask, where do they get their groceries and other goods? How do they expect medical services to reach them in an emergency? How do they expect commerce to occur within an arms reach but at reasonable prices? " If they live in New York, presumably they get their food from bodegas. Those corner stores in turn get their inventory…

Shippers will have to pay a congestion charge but will also experience less congestion, which means they might well be able to charge less money.

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#337

Post by megy » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 11:04 PM UTC

Jorge1o1 wrote: post #31

The streets were never free. We paid for it with our tax money. (Not to mention our 22 trillion dollar public debt) I don’t think people expect streets to be free in the same way you don’t expect the police department to be free, the fire department to be free, public schools, etc. In any case, my point is, we paid for the streets with our tax money and our debt, so don’t masquerade this as some kind of “economic rec…

We paid for it, but only drivers get to use it. And when they aren't using it, they are off limits. And on top of that, they are incredibly dangerous, with a million direct deaths a year.

And in a lot of cities, roads take up more space than private residences. Such a huge waste.

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#338

Post by austhrow743 » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 11:40 PM UTC

strictnein wrote: post #264

CountSessine wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So some combination of tax money and tolls/congestion pricing seems to make the most sense from this usage based angle. No, it doesn't. Paying through general revenue doesn't make any sense at all. Congestion pricing is beautiful because only the people who use it will pay it, and that includes your examples. People who take Ubers or order something online or get food delivery will still pay congestion pricing, but t…

Everyone uses the roads. There's no one who doesn't either use them for transportation, or receive goods brought in on them. You're not going to avoid these fees because you don't drive, you'll just be paying for them through higher prices on the goods you buy.

You wont be paying them equally on all goods. The small good will gain a cost advantage over the large good. The digital good will gain a cost advantage over the physical good. The good delivered during non peak hours will gain a cost advantage over the good delivered during rush hour. The good delivered by drone will gain a cost advantage over the good delivered by land vehicle.

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#339

Post by tokyodude » Thu, Apr 04, 2019, 11:54 PM UTC

mjevans wrote: post #256

perennate wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, what is the better alternative? Doubling the number of roads? Building ten or so elevated highways crisscrossing Manhattan?

Probably some mixture of the following tactics. ## Fix the subway (by which I mean make it more like Japan's rail): * Make loitering illegal, enforce it * A 'short loop' everything recorded space This is anti-vandalism / for crimes within a day * Since this is the US, safety barrier the train * In-city Automated circuits, automated schedule. There'd also need to be baked in maintenance, but I'm not an expert in subwa…

make it more like Japan means privatizing the public transportation and giving the companies running the lines the ability to buy and own real estate in and around the stations as well as not giving all lines to one company

Re: The Streets Were Never Free. Congestion Pricing Finally Makes That Plain

#340

Post by imgabe » Fri, Apr 05, 2019, 12:00 AM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #332

imgabe wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you make $50,000, the various governments take $5000 or more of the top $10,000 in taxes and benefits phase outs. So if you made $40,000 instead, you wouldn't have $10,000 less money, you would have $5000 less money because you would also pay $5000 less in taxes. If keeping the $50,000 job also costs you $5000 in congestion charges, the job that "pays more" no longer does. > The taxes on the extra $10,000 don't…

> People making $50k per year are not in the 50% marginal tax bracket. You're not counting state and local taxes and benefits phase outs. The benefits phase outs are a bear -- for low and middle income people they often exceed the taxes. > I would be willing to wager there is almost nobody making $50k who drives to work in lower Manhattan by themselves. To wear a suit and work in an office? No, probably not. But many…

> But what about the principle is dependent on the income level to begin with? It's just an example. Isn't it also bad to force out the person making $70,000 who then takes another job somewhere else for $60,000?

You have to use real numbers. The congestion charge is going to be about $3k per year, which is NOT a $10k difference in gross income at this level, no matter how many taxes you include. If someone happens to find a job that pays exactly the perfect amount less where they break even on paying the congestion charge, well, good for them, I guess? Salary is not the only reason people take jobs, and it's likely they'd have more opportunities to advance in the city anyway.

>How is congestion pricing better than building enough housing in the city that everyone who works there can afford to live there instead of having to commute in?

Here are several ways it is better:

1. Building housing costs money. Congestion fares raise money.

2. The city is generally not in the business of building housing. This is something the private sector does.

3. Again, there is absolutely no reason we can't do both.