When you have 10,000 buyers and only 100 homes to choose from. That's a shortage.
If you have 10,000 buyers and only 100 homes, the price is too low. In an auction, the willing buyers bid up the price until the number of remaining buyers equals the number of items for sale. Then the bidding stops and the auction ends with the shortage eliminated.
taxing land owner excessively like that will mean that few people will own land and only the wealthy will.
I think you underestimate the lengths the wealthy will go through to avoid paying taxes. But if you're correct that only the wealthy will own land, is it really such a bad thing to take their money and give it to the poor as I'm suggesting by increasing a progressive tax and decreasing a regressive one?
Shortage here means...nothing is available on the market.
I think you're saying there are no properties for sale in San Francisco.
instead of selling their properties and adding to the inventory of available real estate, they hold on to it and make more money.
Land banking is easy to fix with higher property taxes and a land value tax. The city could use the revenue to lower or eliminate the sales tax. This would (1) eliminate land banking and thereby make housing more affordable, (2) improve economic mobility by increasing a progressive tax and reducing a regressive tax, and (3) improve the local economy by encouraging people to do more of their shopping in brick and mortar stores and less of their shopping online.
reducing housing availability and driving up prices in a city that already has a desperate shortage of it.
Really? There's a black market for housing in San Francisco because people can't buy it on the open market for any price? (This is an objective sign of a true shortage, just ask Venezuela.)
No, I think it's far more likely that the "shortage" is actually just your way of saying that the prices are higher than you think they ought to be.
If convicts could get out of prison as soon as an insurance company will insure them against repeat offenses, then all sentences would be the same: they would be the grown-up version of "sit in the corner until you've learned your lesson."
Can you think of a better incentive to rehabilitate than to know that you'll get out as soon as you're cured? Is there any good reason to keep people locked up longer than that? Is it wise to release people before they've rehabilitated?
the city can not be responsible for the irresponsible decisions that people make while under the influence of alcohol that places the safety of others at risk.
What this law is designed to do...is stop people from hoarding property... There are people who own a dozen properties and list them on AirBnB or just keep them empty and use it as a store of value.
Scalpers will only do that if the price is below market equilibrium, because otherwise there's no profit to be made. So root cause of demand exceeding supply is the low, below-market-equilibrium price.
This is the right answer. What the scalpers are doing is engaging in arbitrage and fixing the shortage which was caused by the original sellers setting the price below market equilibrium. Selling the tickets on eBay would significantly reduce the amount of profit a scalper could make.
I don't really see the purpose of this. If you have the physical network, then all you need is a connection to the rest of the public Internet.
That's correct. This is just last-mile infrastructure, like back in the day when you had to dial into the ISP over telephone wires not owned by the ISP. In both cases, the ISP still has to physically connect to the upstream provider miles away (this isn't cheap), configure and maintain the routing protocol (this requires technical knowledge and coordination with the upstream provider who isn't interested in talking to the end user), and pay by the gigabyte for data.
Services like e-mail and personal web space are just extras that an ISP might provide if they feel like it.
My Nexus 5 has 2 GB, and I often run out of RAM which slows down the phone. Right now it's using all but 382M. If I force close apps or reboot, I can reclaim some of that free RAM. So it would be nice to have at least double the RAM in order to keep the phone running smoothly without requiring regular maintenance on my part.
Do I need 6GB instead of 4GB? Maybe not, but it couldn't hurt, especially when it's so cheap. Someone once said 640KB ought to be enough for anybody, and we all know how that turned out!
Obviously the fact that price gouging aka "usage based pricing" exists is a perfect example of why the government regulators need to step in and regulate.
Or the exact opposite: eliminate legislation that supports monopolies.
in a vehicle where stopping suddenly at the wrong time or in the wrong place could be more dangerous than carrying on until it's safer, there is no perfect failsafe mode.
In the absence of someone tailgating you, when is controlled braking dangerous?
A residential street...is almost always 25 miles per hour or even less. Not many peopple who are trying to avoid traffic eve drive that speed.
This is why they need to put back in the roadside trees, the ones they remove with great enthusiasm because motorists keep hitting them. Roadside trees give motorists a greater sense of speed so they will drive more slowly.
These neighborhoods only need to convince their local traffic "engineers" (I use this word in the most optimistic sense possible) that a few airbag-equipped cars hitting trees is a much better outcome than neighborhood children getting mowed down.
The main problem though is the lack of alternate routes for traffic.
Actually, the main problem is that the main routes are priced below market equilibrium. This is why traffic congestion exists in the first place, by definition.
Freeway traffic congestion is a problem that has already been solved by variable tolling. And local traffic congestion is caused by too many places to park ("induced demand"), just as surely as mosquitoes are caused by standing water. Once we stop expecting to get everything for free, we can start to make real progress in permanently eliminating traffic congestion.
a...group...who believe bicycles belong in the middle of regular motor vehicle lanes
Actually, what vehicular cyclists really believe is that bicyclists should act "as drivers of vehicles." Did you know that slow-moving vehicles are already required to be driven as close as practicable to the right-hand edge or curb? A bicycle is (usually) a slow-moving vehicle, so why should it be treated differently under the law than other slow-moving vehicles?
Sometimes it's safer to ride in the middle of the lane, such as when the bike lane is full of debris, or there's no bike lane, and the regular traffic lane is too narrow to share side by side with a vehicle. Riding in the center of the lane makes the bicyclist more visible and forces motorists to change lanes to pass instead of passing unsafely close to the bicyclist.
Yes, passing and the use of the turn signal have become a lost art among motorists. This is why self-driving cars can't arrive soon enough.
The amount of commerce and economic activity an interstate highway system creates more than covers the other half.
If that's true, then it shouldn't be difficult to make the road pay for itself 100% through user fees.
How do you think your box of Fruity Pebbles got to the grocery store?
Did you know that they used to build grocery stores right next to railroad spurs? True story. But now that freeways are so highly subsidized, there's no longer any need to.
Drivers aren't the only ones getting value from roads.
They are the only ones who benefit directly from the roads.
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If you have 10,000 buyers and only 100 homes, the price is too low. In an auction, the willing buyers bid up the price until the number of remaining buyers equals the number of items for sale. Then the bidding stops and the auction ends with the shortage eliminated.
I think you underestimate the lengths the wealthy will go through to avoid paying taxes. But if you're correct that only the wealthy will own land, is it really such a bad thing to take their money and give it to the poor as I'm suggesting by increasing a progressive tax and decreasing a regressive one?
I think you're saying there are no properties for sale in San Francisco.
Land banking is easy to fix with higher property taxes and a land value tax. The city could use the revenue to lower or eliminate the sales tax. This would (1) eliminate land banking and thereby make housing more affordable, (2) improve economic mobility by increasing a progressive tax and reducing a regressive tax, and (3) improve the local economy by encouraging people to do more of their shopping in brick and mortar stores and less of their shopping online.
Really? There's a black market for housing in San Francisco because people can't buy it on the open market for any price? (This is an objective sign of a true shortage, just ask Venezuela.)
No, I think it's far more likely that the "shortage" is actually just your way of saying that the prices are higher than you think they ought to be.
If convicts could get out of prison as soon as an insurance company will insure them against repeat offenses, then all sentences would be the same: they would be the grown-up version of "sit in the corner until you've learned your lesson."
Can you think of a better incentive to rehabilitate than to know that you'll get out as soon as you're cured? Is there any good reason to keep people locked up longer than that? Is it wise to release people before they've rehabilitated?
I think a well-programmed self-driving car knows to slow down in the close proximity of pedestrians.
Why does a self-driving car need a parking space?
When the city forces breweries to provide parking for their customers, then I think the city is at least partially responsible for the predictable drunk driving crashes that result, don't you?
And how is it not entrapment when the city encourages a behavior and then prosecutes people for doing it?
This is one reason why we need a land value tax.
No, whoever's selling the tickets at such deflated prices is ripping off the performers and creating ideal conditions for scalping.
Scalpers will only do that if the price is below market equilibrium, because otherwise there's no profit to be made. So root cause of demand exceeding supply is the low, below-market-equilibrium price.
This is the right answer. What the scalpers are doing is engaging in arbitrage and fixing the shortage which was caused by the original sellers setting the price below market equilibrium. Selling the tickets on eBay would significantly reduce the amount of profit a scalper could make.
Tell that to those who live in tax-inefficient suburbs and yet complain the loudest when things don't go their way!
That's correct. This is just last-mile infrastructure, like back in the day when you had to dial into the ISP over telephone wires not owned by the ISP. In both cases, the ISP still has to physically connect to the upstream provider miles away (this isn't cheap), configure and maintain the routing protocol (this requires technical knowledge and coordination with the upstream provider who isn't interested in talking to the end user), and pay by the gigabyte for data.
Services like e-mail and personal web space are just extras that an ISP might provide if they feel like it.
My Nexus 5 has 2 GB, and I often run out of RAM which slows down the phone. Right now it's using all but 382M. If I force close apps or reboot, I can reclaim some of that free RAM. So it would be nice to have at least double the RAM in order to keep the phone running smoothly without requiring regular maintenance on my part.
Do I need 6GB instead of 4GB? Maybe not, but it couldn't hurt, especially when it's so cheap. Someone once said 640KB ought to be enough for anybody, and we all know how that turned out!
Prohibiting people from running servers is practically the same thing as data caps.
Why not let each neighborhood decide individually which ISP gets to use their wires?
Or the exact opposite: eliminate legislation that supports monopolies.
I bet a self-driving car wouldn't hit a couch or a stopped Tesla.
In the absence of someone tailgating you, when is controlled braking dangerous?
This is why they need to put back in the roadside trees, the ones they remove with great enthusiasm because motorists keep hitting them. Roadside trees give motorists a greater sense of speed so they will drive more slowly.
These neighborhoods only need to convince their local traffic "engineers" (I use this word in the most optimistic sense possible) that a few airbag-equipped cars hitting trees is a much better outcome than neighborhood children getting mowed down.
Actually, the main problem is that the main routes are priced below market equilibrium. This is why traffic congestion exists in the first place, by definition.
Freeway traffic congestion is a problem that has already been solved by variable tolling. And local traffic congestion is caused by too many places to park ("induced demand"), just as surely as mosquitoes are caused by standing water. Once we stop expecting to get everything for free, we can start to make real progress in permanently eliminating traffic congestion.
Not right here, but yes, almost anywhere else.
It's unfortunate that the road wasn't designed well for everyone who might want to use it. Planners in the USA are laughably bad at their profession.
False.
Actually, what vehicular cyclists really believe is that bicyclists should act "as drivers of vehicles." Did you know that slow-moving vehicles are already required to be driven as close as practicable to the right-hand edge or curb? A bicycle is (usually) a slow-moving vehicle, so why should it be treated differently under the law than other slow-moving vehicles?
Sometimes it's safer to ride in the middle of the lane, such as when the bike lane is full of debris, or there's no bike lane, and the regular traffic lane is too narrow to share side by side with a vehicle. Riding in the center of the lane makes the bicyclist more visible and forces motorists to change lanes to pass instead of passing unsafely close to the bicyclist.
Yes, passing and the use of the turn signal have become a lost art among motorists. This is why self-driving cars can't arrive soon enough.
If that's true, then it shouldn't be difficult to make the road pay for itself 100% through user fees.
Did you know that they used to build grocery stores right next to railroad spurs? True story. But now that freeways are so highly subsidized, there's no longer any need to.
They are the only ones who benefit directly from the roads.