4 ms·
That's not quite correct... fiscal discipline isn't going to make most suburb-heavy cities in America solvent. You can't cut your way to profitability in the lo
by xenadu02 10y ago
That's not quite correct... fiscal discipline isn't going to make most suburb-heavy cities in America solvent. You can't cut your way to profitability in the long term, you can only stave off bankruptcy in the short term.
The article is saying that mostly-suburb cities are not sustainable. They cost more to build and maintain over the long term than the majority of cities can recoup in taxes. That has little to do with employees, they are mostly talking about straight-line capital costs to dig up the streets and install new sewer lines. Even worse is that many cities grew in a relatively small post-war boom so a lot of that infrastructure will need replacing at the same time.
Towns don't typically provide all of water, sewer, storm sewer, and other such services... they might provide water. They can also just dig up everyone's yard to replace what infrastructure they do have because things are more spread out (lost of "wasted" land between the house and road) and far fewer people are disrupted (that also means projects can be done at a slower pace). They also have a much sparser police and fire department, far fewer parks, etc.
- intrasight 10y agoYou are indeed supporting my assertion that towns have different economics. Mine is an old suburb (1920s) of a medium-sized city (Pittsburgh). And as I stated, our town is sustainable. We have "more" parks not "fewer parks". Parks require much less maintenance cost than does residential spaces(plus much is done by volunteers). I'll also assert again that how "spread out" things are doesn't matter. If anything, denser clusters will have lower maintenance costs (less digging). So how can we make cities have the same fiscal discipline of towns? We'd have to reverse the land-grab of the cities. Have them split into fiscal units the same size as my town (20K people). Have the managers have to come ask those residence to approve their budget. Same issue with schools. Why does the Pittsburgh city school district spend the same per pupil as the suburbs, but the such worse results? Lack of fiscal discipline.
- dkuebric 10y agoI don't think the schools example is parallel. There's a lot of factors that go into the success of a student, both in and outside of school. Equal funding doesn't translate to equal opportunity.
- intrasight 10y agoBut I'm not talking about individual students. In my example, we'd be averaging the students individual situation over the 20-30K in their new fiscal neighborhood. Any "success factors" that did exist across such averages would be more than canceled out by the empowerment given to parent and child.
- seanmcdirmid 10y agoFor your last point, if your student demographic is more impoverished, you will get worse results compared to a more well off demographic even with the same per pupil spending; the resources the kid has at home is important! (Charter schools get their results through selection bias, American suburbs with large lots that aren't suitable for low income housing likewise). The white flight to the suburbs in the 60s is largely responsible for that, creating a negative feedback loop that we haven't been able to break even now. Anyways, it isn't always about fiscal discipline, often the answer is much more obvious than that. Suburbs basically outsourced poverty to the cities.
- intrasight 10y agoThis is the 21st century. Urbanites are not impoverished.
- intrasight 10y agoNot sure why the downvotes. There way more activity in the urban core here now, and both young adults and empty-nesters are choosing to move into the city. What used to be boarded-up storefronts are now cafes, bookstores, art galleries, restaurants, etc. Please don't continue giving progressivism a bad rap by sticking with this "impoverished city" bs.
- danans 10y agoNeither young adults nor empty-nesters are the demographic that impoverished school-age children are associated with, so those populations moving into the urban core doesn't have a very direct positive impact on the educational outcomes of schools that impoverished children attend.
- intrasight 10y agoThen we'll have to wait 5-6 years to see if these young adults stay in the city after they have kids. Frankly I am hopeful that they will.