5 ms·

Wow... outstanding haha. So in bringing more business to an area, they need to pay twice? At what point do people actually own the land they own?

awinder 10y ago
Uh, yeah, they have to cost-share the burden of upsetting the current infrastructure. Say you owned a piece of property adjacent to where all this new building is going on. Is it your responsibility to chip in? Is it your responsibility to shoulder the cost burden of what is effectively a zoning-related issue? I mean, god, when do you really own the property you're standing on? You didn't even ask for all this development, but now you've got to pay for expanding the infrastructure because a new developer wants to reap financial reward by developing up his land? Yeah. It's not a property freedom issue, it's a cost ecosystem issue. As time goes on and life changes, owning property is going to have fluid costs, and tax assessments on people who come in to develop land is one way to defray those costs from disproportionately hitting people who have lived in an area for a long time. Frankly, those people would never really plan for that kind of thing to happen, so you're avoiding a lot of nasty repercussions by taxing the person upsetting the ecosystem, rather than the members of the ecosystem itself.
talmand 10y ago
If failure to pay property taxes means you vacating the property after government seizure, then you don't own the land anyway. Threat of seizure is a serious problem for a business, why not force them to pay twice?
- djschnei 10y ago
  uuuuuh because it's immoral? You're saying "well we already threaten them with violence/guns to pay once, might as well do it twice" - I shouldn't have to explain my objections.
  - talmand 10y ago
    I'm not sure you understand the point of my comment. I was sarcastically agreeing with you.
goldbrick 10y ago
1) the developer doesn't "bring" business to the area, they are supported by their clients and are responding to economic incentives, same as anyone else. 2) if you do perceive them as "bringing" business, then it's only right to equally perceive them as bringing congestion, pollution, and all the other undesirable side effects of economic activity. 3) when does one ever "own" land? Property rights are enforced by the government, it's only fair that they receive compensation for that.
- jessriedel 10y ago
  > Property rights are enforced by the government, it's only fair that they receive compensation for that. The compensation they extract has nothing to do with the cost of enforcing property rights, because those costs are trivial.
  - goldbrick 10y ago
    Not trivial at all, just mostly invisible and most of us who've only known modern western societies never give it a second thought.
    - jessriedel 10y ago
      Try again. Law enforcement was just 9% of the Cupertino municipal budget in 2015. http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=1222 http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=1222 What fraction of that do you want to bet has anything to do with protecting private property, as opposed to the large revenue generating activities like parking tickets?
      - goldbrick 10y ago
        Like I said, completely invisible to you.
    - djschnei 10y ago
      Try again. That "protection" you're referencing is actually the natural cooperation between rational actors that capitalism and market economies in general foster and perpetuate. Capitalism is the invisible hand, not government.
tamana 10y ago
Never. Land is partly common property. Real estate is taxed ongoing because the Earth has finite land. Google "Land Value Tax"
- djschnei 10y ago
  Luckily, we have a totally non coercive, completely voluntary way to regulate the use of finite resources, which automagically allocates resources favoring their most productive uses. It's called a market economy. How can something that is common property, like you assert (I disagree) be claimed arbitrarily by one group of people and charged for?
rhino369 10y ago
>So in bringing more business to an area, they need to pay twice? It's very possible for situation where whatever property tax the city gets isn't enough to cover the actual services a company requires. Fire, EMS, police, road construction, etc. This is especially true when the workers are mostly commuters. Then the workers don't pay local taxes either. There are positive externalities like nearby restaurants and hotels with increased business. Its really unfair to blame apple for it since they didn't make the rules. But I think it would be fair to levy a "worker" tax that tries to raise revenue for teh city to service the thousands of employees who spend 8-12 hours a day in Cupertino but don't pay a cent in taxes.

awinder 10y ago

Uh, yeah, they have to cost-share the burden of upsetting the current infrastructure. Say you owned a piece of property adjacent to where all this new building is going on. Is it your responsibility to chip in? Is it your responsibility to shoulder the cost burden of what is effectively a zoning-related issue? I mean, god, when do you really own the property you're standing on? You didn't even ask for all this development, but now you've got to pay for expanding the infrastructure because a new developer wants to reap financial reward by developing up his land? Yeah. It's not a property freedom issue, it's a cost ecosystem issue. As time goes on and life changes, owning property is going to have fluid costs, and tax assessments on people who come in to develop land is one way to defray those costs from disproportionately hitting people who have lived in an area for a long time. Frankly, those people would never really plan for that kind of thing to happen, so you're avoiding a lot of nasty repercussions by taxing the person upsetting the ecosystem, rather than the members of the ecosystem itself.

talmand 10y ago

If failure to pay property taxes means you vacating the property after government seizure, then you don't own the land anyway. Threat of seizure is a serious problem for a business, why not force them to pay twice?

djschnei 10y ago
uuuuuh because it's immoral? You're saying "well we already threaten them with violence/guns to pay once, might as well do it twice" - I shouldn't have to explain my objections.
- talmand 10y ago
  I'm not sure you understand the point of my comment. I was sarcastically agreeing with you.

goldbrick 10y ago

1) the developer doesn't "bring" business to the area, they are supported by their clients and are responding to economic incentives, same as anyone else. 2) if you do perceive them as "bringing" business, then it's only right to equally perceive them as bringing congestion, pollution, and all the other undesirable side effects of economic activity. 3) when does one ever "own" land? Property rights are enforced by the government, it's only fair that they receive compensation for that.

jessriedel 10y ago
> Property rights are enforced by the government, it's only fair that they receive compensation for that. The compensation they extract has nothing to do with the cost of enforcing property rights, because those costs are trivial.
- goldbrick 10y ago
  Not trivial at all, just mostly invisible and most of us who've only known modern western societies never give it a second thought.
  - jessriedel 10y ago
    Try again. Law enforcement was just 9% of the Cupertino municipal budget in 2015. http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=1222 http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=1222 What fraction of that do you want to bet has anything to do with protecting private property, as opposed to the large revenue generating activities like parking tickets?
    - goldbrick 10y ago
      Like I said, completely invisible to you.
  - djschnei 10y ago
    Try again. That "protection" you're referencing is actually the natural cooperation between rational actors that capitalism and market economies in general foster and perpetuate. Capitalism is the invisible hand, not government.

tamana 10y ago

Never. Land is partly common property. Real estate is taxed ongoing because the Earth has finite land. Google "Land Value Tax"

djschnei 10y ago
Luckily, we have a totally non coercive, completely voluntary way to regulate the use of finite resources, which automagically allocates resources favoring their most productive uses. It's called a market economy. How can something that is common property, like you assert (I disagree) be claimed arbitrarily by one group of people and charged for?

rhino369 10y ago

>So in bringing more business to an area, they need to pay twice? It's very possible for situation where whatever property tax the city gets isn't enough to cover the actual services a company requires. Fire, EMS, police, road construction, etc. This is especially true when the workers are mostly commuters. Then the workers don't pay local taxes either. There are positive externalities like nearby restaurants and hotels with increased business. Its really unfair to blame apple for it since they didn't make the rules. But I think it would be fair to levy a "worker" tax that tries to raise revenue for teh city to service the thousands of employees who spend 8-12 hours a day in Cupertino but don't pay a cent in taxes.