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How does a development boom burden tax payers? Were there no business created in the "unrestricted development?" It stands to reason that a healthy business c

by hnal943 17y ago

How does a development boom burden tax payers? Were there no business created in the "unrestricted development?" It stands to reason that a healthy business climate generates tax revenue, instead of increasing the taxes of existing tax payers.

rfghjhbg 17y ago
No - they were mostly just housing suburbs. That brings in income from fees when the houses are built - but you have roads, sewer/water, schools, hospitals to fund forever. That's fine as long as the people living in those houses are tax-profitable middle class dual income. As soon as they aren't you have just built a 500,000 person slum to fund.
- kingkongreveng_ 17y ago
  To my understanding, the financial picture of North American cities is essentially driven by public employee salary and benefit costs, which are out of control due to unions. Whether a city is struggling or not right now, or will struggle in the future, is largely a question of how high they let the payroll and pension benefits drift.
9oliYQjP 17y ago
rfghjhbg said it best. They did attract a few big businesses. Microsoft Canada has their headquarters (I believe that's what it is) in Mississauga. But they did so with the lure of unsustainably low taxes on these businesses. What's worse is that for the most part, there's not enough work in Mississauga itself to sustain its population. So a huge percentage of its population works in Toronto and surrounding cities. Fundamentally, Mississauga depends heavily on Toronto for the jobs of its population as the manufacturing businesses it attracted are hurting right now and never could sustain the huge population. I don't want to make it sound like I'm bashing Mississauga. Toronto created this phenomenon of commuter ghettos by ignoring the living needs of middle class families through most of the 1980s and 1990s. Toronto also let just enough businesses escape to these outer suburbs through high taxes, to make it seem like a feasible option to move out there. So people did, but most of the jobs that a professional who lives in these communities works at are still in Toronto itself. For the most part the only thing keeping downtown Toronto itself from being a mess is that it's the financial hub for Canada. This sphere of influence is not necessarily permanent though and I worry about this city a lot. Alberta is where a lot of the resources are and it would make sense for the financial sector to be there. We like to poke fun of Albertans because they have all their eggs in the oil basket. But right now Toronto has all its eggs in the banking basket. It's a very fragile proposition.

by hnal943 17y ago

rfghjhbg 17y ago

No - they were mostly just housing suburbs. That brings in income from fees when the houses are built - but you have roads, sewer/water, schools, hospitals to fund forever. That's fine as long as the people living in those houses are tax-profitable middle class dual income. As soon as they aren't you have just built a 500,000 person slum to fund.

kingkongreveng_ 17y ago
To my understanding, the financial picture of North American cities is essentially driven by public employee salary and benefit costs, which are out of control due to unions. Whether a city is struggling or not right now, or will struggle in the future, is largely a question of how high they let the payroll and pension benefits drift.

9oliYQjP 17y ago

rfghjhbg said it best. They did attract a few big businesses. Microsoft Canada has their headquarters (I believe that's what it is) in Mississauga. But they did so with the lure of unsustainably low taxes on these businesses. What's worse is that for the most part, there's not enough work in Mississauga itself to sustain its population. So a huge percentage of its population works in Toronto and surrounding cities. Fundamentally, Mississauga depends heavily on Toronto for the jobs of its population as the manufacturing businesses it attracted are hurting right now and never could sustain the huge population. I don't want to make it sound like I'm bashing Mississauga. Toronto created this phenomenon of commuter ghettos by ignoring the living needs of middle class families through most of the 1980s and 1990s. Toronto also let just enough businesses escape to these outer suburbs through high taxes, to make it seem like a feasible option to move out there. So people did, but most of the jobs that a professional who lives in these communities works at are still in Toronto itself. For the most part the only thing keeping downtown Toronto itself from being a mess is that it's the financial hub for Canada. This sphere of influence is not necessarily permanent though and I worry about this city a lot. Alberta is where a lot of the resources are and it would make sense for the financial sector to be there. We like to poke fun of Albertans because they have all their eggs in the oil basket. But right now Toronto has all its eggs in the banking basket. It's a very fragile proposition.