It's true that the vast majority of damage to roadways is from trucks, but there's also an opportunity cost of roads to which every road user contributes.
In other words, if you could magically remove a portion of users from the roads without affecting commerce, you could reclaim some of the lesser-used road lanes for taxpaying businesses and thereby improve that land's cost effectiveness to the city.
Parking meters still impose a cost on the preexisting residents...
Not all pre-existing residents. Just those who choose to use a taxpayer-owned resource to store their personal belongings. As a taxpayer, parking meters make perfect sense to me because they give me a return on my investment.
Even better would be to not waste so much land on streets wide enough for street parking where it isn't needed. There's no reason why the street couldn't be narrowed and the excess land sold to the adjacent property owners. This would also neatly solve the problem of business customers parking in residential neighborhoods without the need for parking meters or enforcement.
Investing in a good S&P500 index fund which will return about 10%. In 18 years, you will be a millionaire.
It's closer to 7%, so you'll be a millionaire in 22 years. You can bring this down to 19 years by contributing the maximum into your 401(k) ($17,500/year), your IRA ($5,500/year), and an HSA ($3,300/year for individuals).
Because the property tax for current owners doesn't keep pace with inflation, California had to create and increase other taxes (for example, the Mello-Roos property tax) to make up the difference.
Any good entrepreneur sees this kind of problem as an opportunity. In Indianapolis on race day, the residents near the track capitalize on the problem by renting out their lawns for parking. They turn the externalized cost into a benefit.
All property owners pay based on their date of purchase, which is entirely fair.
I pay five times what my neighbor pays in property tax for the same model simply because my neighbor bought in 1977 and I bought in 2010. Prop 13 is good for older people who have been here a while but not so good for people trying to buy their first home.
I can understand the desire to prevent the government from raising property taxes too quickly, but there's really no good reason to set the annual assessment increase limit below the normal rate of inflation.
What would a truly level playing field for transportation look like to you? Would developers be forced, as they usually are today, to build more than the fiscally optimal amount of parking? ("Fiscally optimal" meaning the amount where the marginal cost of building another parking space (MC) equals the marginal revenue from building it (MR).)
That depends on what the money is spent on. If the money is spent on something that brings a greater benefit than the cost, it helps the economy. Taxing yourself to buy a car doesn't automatically hurt your household economy--it depends on how much you spent on the car and how much income your car will bring.
Maybe some people are worse off, but millions are MUCH better off by not being denied health care for pre-existing conditions...
To my knowledge, nobody has ever been denied health care for pre-existing conditions. Health insurance, yes, but not health care.
Are millions really better off? Self-insurance on average is cheaper than paying for insurance. Exceptions are the elderly, the poor, and the (previously) uninsurable, all of whom are now being subsidized by young, healthy people. So for those young, healthy people, and maybe also for more average people, Obamacare isn't necessarily a net benefit.
That said, it's a good thing that insurance companies are no longer allowed to deny health insurance, and it also makes sense to provide assistance to the poor. Although it should be questioned why the elderly, who have been saving all their lives and generally have higher net worths than the young, should get a subsidy?
Property taxes and rent rising pushes out renters who have lived there a long time.
That's balanced by increased job opportunities that keep people in the neighborhood longer. Is there any evidence that gentrification creates a net exodus of low-income residents?
In any case, this is one reason why property taxes should be proportional to the property's burden on the surrounding infrastructure, not the property's value.
Virtually nothing has H.265 support right now. Are you seriously suggesting every single electronic device capable of playing video will magically become "obsolete" in a few months?
When a new model of a device gains H.265 support, the old model will become obsolete.
While H.265 is practically required for 2160p/4k video because it uses about half the bandwidth of H.264, Netflix for example will also save a lot of money in bandwidth costs by converting its library of HD and SD video to H.265.
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Consider it part of the cost of living away from civilization.
"If you love nature, stay away from it." --Henry David Thoreau
If you don't know why our current system tends to favor only two viable candidates, then you are part of the reason that, in your words, "there is no one left representing US!"
It's true that the vast majority of damage to roadways is from trucks, but there's also an opportunity cost of roads to which every road user contributes.
In other words, if you could magically remove a portion of users from the roads without affecting commerce, you could reclaim some of the lesser-used road lanes for taxpaying businesses and thereby improve that land's cost effectiveness to the city.
Should we take ethanol out of gasoline and put MTBE back in? Discuss.
I would much rather have a bad law that requires an effort to keep in place than a bad law that requires an effort to repeal.
And, "not until you've tested it on a small scale and put in a sunset clause in case it doesn't work as expected."
The insurance premium on that building must have been astronomical until it was fixed!
Not all pre-existing residents. Just those who choose to use a taxpayer-owned resource to store their personal belongings. As a taxpayer, parking meters make perfect sense to me because they give me a return on my investment.
Even better would be to not waste so much land on streets wide enough for street parking where it isn't needed. There's no reason why the street couldn't be narrowed and the excess land sold to the adjacent property owners. This would also neatly solve the problem of business customers parking in residential neighborhoods without the need for parking meters or enforcement.
It's closer to 7%, so you'll be a millionaire in 22 years. You can bring this down to 19 years by contributing the maximum into your 401(k) ($17,500/year), your IRA ($5,500/year), and an HSA ($3,300/year for individuals).
Why can't the neighborhood set up parking meters or parking permits?
Because the property tax for current owners doesn't keep pace with inflation, California had to create and increase other taxes (for example, the Mello-Roos property tax) to make up the difference.
Any good entrepreneur sees this kind of problem as an opportunity. In Indianapolis on race day, the residents near the track capitalize on the problem by renting out their lawns for parking. They turn the externalized cost into a benefit.
I pay five times what my neighbor pays in property tax for the same model simply because my neighbor bought in 1977 and I bought in 2010. Prop 13 is good for older people who have been here a while but not so good for people trying to buy their first home.
I can understand the desire to prevent the government from raising property taxes too quickly, but there's really no good reason to set the annual assessment increase limit below the normal rate of inflation.
What would a truly level playing field for transportation look like to you? Would developers be forced, as they usually are today, to build more than the fiscally optimal amount of parking? ("Fiscally optimal" meaning the amount where the marginal cost of building another parking space (MC) equals the marginal revenue from building it (MR).)
Tall buildings don't cause congestion, parking garages do. Solution: allow developers to build as little parking as they feel the market desires.
This map (which shows the allowed building heights in San Francisco, where yellow is 4 stories. And Mountain View has forbidden Google from building more housing.
So as you can see, developers won't build more housing because they aren't being allowed to.
When the income tax is progressive, is it bad to discourage people from making over £150,000 a year? If so, why?
That depends on what the money is spent on. If the money is spent on something that brings a greater benefit than the cost, it helps the economy. Taxing yourself to buy a car doesn't automatically hurt your household economy--it depends on how much you spent on the car and how much income your car will bring.
And anyone who needs to park there only occasionally.
"Free parking" just means the cost is passed on to you a little less transparently.
To my knowledge, nobody has ever been denied health care for pre-existing conditions. Health insurance, yes, but not health care.
Are millions really better off? Self-insurance on average is cheaper than paying for insurance. Exceptions are the elderly, the poor, and the (previously) uninsurable, all of whom are now being subsidized by young, healthy people. So for those young, healthy people, and maybe also for more average people, Obamacare isn't necessarily a net benefit.
That said, it's a good thing that insurance companies are no longer allowed to deny health insurance, and it also makes sense to provide assistance to the poor. Although it should be questioned why the elderly, who have been saving all their lives and generally have higher net worths than the young, should get a subsidy?
That's balanced by increased job opportunities that keep people in the neighborhood longer. Is there any evidence that gentrification creates a net exodus of low-income residents?
In any case, this is one reason why property taxes should be proportional to the property's burden on the surrounding infrastructure, not the property's value.
They also take on the opportunity cost of capital which is around 7% annually of the cost of the installation. That's $700 per year or $58 per month for a $10,000 installation.
When a new model of a device gains H.265 support, the old model will become obsolete.
While H.265 is practically required for 2160p/4k video because it uses about half the bandwidth of H.264, Netflix for example will also save a lot of money in bandwidth costs by converting its library of HD and SD video to H.265.