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I agree, finance is being used here as a way of framing sustainability. But it's obscuring and distorting the entire basis of economy altogether, which is livi

I agree, finance is being used here as a way of framing sustainability. But it's obscuring and distorting the entire basis of economy altogether, which is living ecology. If people are denied the basic ability to improve the livability of their communities because of allegiance to global market tab sheets, then money has replaced the very thing it is meant to serve: human beings. All this talk of there not being any jobs is hypocritical balogne. There's clearly plenty of infrastructure work to do, not to mention basic life stuff, like raising and teaching kids, growing food, building community... But the global market has stripped life itself of its value for these people. Your community and mine aren't far behind, from the looks of things!

bmelton 10y ago
I think you're missing a lot here. The city isn't failing for lack of jobs, but for lack of jobs that produce value. A job rebuilding the infrastructure of an area is only valuable if there are other jobs from which you can tax to justify that. If I spend $100 million to fund a trench that does nothing, it's a money sink. I've effectively thrown that money away. However, I have achieved however much employment that $100mm bought me. Until and unless that $100mm gets somebody some value, it isn't worthwhile, and as we've seen, there are very few people willing to fund completely pointless projects for no reason... even governments try to avoid it. This is different than health care spending, or housing, or welfare -- those things (at least arguably) provide benefits. If I give someone health care for free, it's largely assumed that the cost of that health care will be offset in other ways. See the discussions on the Utah Unemployment article for examples. But because governments are funded by tax dollars, and tax dollars are generated by earnings, until and unless people are earning moneys from outside the government that pays them, it simply isn't sustainable. Building infrastructure in the middle of nowhere is fruitless it is used as a lure for some form of money or productivity. The absence of said productivity means that, at best, you'll be revenue neutral on the funding projects and sustainable until inevitably inflation wipes everything away. Of course, to do that, the community has to be entirely self sustainable, which Flint definitely isn't. In short, tax and spend can't work unless there's something to tax that isn't also part of the spend.
- macawfish 10y ago
  The only things I'm missing are the points from the downvotes I keep getting in this thread. See, the thing here is that you and I are operating with completely different definitions of the word "value". I'm insisting to you that clean water is intrinsically valuable. Yet you impose a restriction on the supposedly free market, claiming that: "a job rebuilding the infrastructure of an area is only valuable if there are other jobs from which you can tax to justify that". But I maintain that it needs no such justification. It's clean water. "When the Last Tree Is Cut Down, the Last Fish Eaten, and the Last Stream Poisoned, You Will Realize That You Cannot Eat Money"
  - bmelton 10y ago
    Clean water is only valuable if someone can get for it greater than what it costs to extract. The aspect you're missing isn't a definition of value, but a model of sustainability. If there's industry enough in an area that there is some other way to pay for water extraction, production, cleaning (see Nevada) -- then water can be sold at a loss because it supports something else, and is sustainable so long as there a mechanism to keep it being so. The problem in Michigan is that the other way to pay for it isn't working, and the government doesn't have the revenues or a profit model to keep it going otherwise. Again, this would be true whether the government were capitalist, socialist, socially democratic, totalitarian or anything else. Economics are true whether or not your ideology agrees, but it shouldn't be controversial to assert that trying to sell luxury goods to Liberia (the poorest area in the world, last I checked) is fruitless, it should be easy enough to replace "luxury goods" with "water", or any other product and still be true.
    - macawfish 10y ago
      I hear you saying that in Nevada, clean water is [economically] sustainable because of [gambling]. But I'm talking about ecological, biological sustainability, insofar as human life is concerned. So yeah, I'm dodging your financial model of sustainability altogether, intentionally, because in this case my entire ideological basis is irreconcilable with your model. water is not a product in my religion, as it is in yours

bmelton 10y ago

I think you're missing a lot here. The city isn't failing for lack of jobs, but for lack of jobs that produce value. A job rebuilding the infrastructure of an area is only valuable if there are other jobs from which you can tax to justify that. If I spend $100 million to fund a trench that does nothing, it's a money sink. I've effectively thrown that money away. However, I have achieved however much employment that $100mm bought me. Until and unless that $100mm gets somebody some value, it isn't worthwhile, and as we've seen, there are very few people willing to fund completely pointless projects for no reason... even governments try to avoid it. This is different than health care spending, or housing, or welfare -- those things (at least arguably) provide benefits. If I give someone health care for free, it's largely assumed that the cost of that health care will be offset in other ways. See the discussions on the Utah Unemployment article for examples. But because governments are funded by tax dollars, and tax dollars are generated by earnings, until and unless people are earning moneys from outside the government that pays them, it simply isn't sustainable. Building infrastructure in the middle of nowhere is fruitless it is used as a lure for some form of money or productivity. The absence of said productivity means that, at best, you'll be revenue neutral on the funding projects and sustainable until inevitably inflation wipes everything away. Of course, to do that, the community has to be entirely self sustainable, which Flint definitely isn't. In short, tax and spend can't work unless there's something to tax that isn't also part of the spend.

macawfish 10y ago
The only things I'm missing are the points from the downvotes I keep getting in this thread. See, the thing here is that you and I are operating with completely different definitions of the word "value". I'm insisting to you that clean water is intrinsically valuable. Yet you impose a restriction on the supposedly free market, claiming that: "a job rebuilding the infrastructure of an area is only valuable if there are other jobs from which you can tax to justify that". But I maintain that it needs no such justification. It's clean water. "When the Last Tree Is Cut Down, the Last Fish Eaten, and the Last Stream Poisoned, You Will Realize That You Cannot Eat Money"
- bmelton 10y ago
  Clean water is only valuable if someone can get for it greater than what it costs to extract. The aspect you're missing isn't a definition of value, but a model of sustainability. If there's industry enough in an area that there is some other way to pay for water extraction, production, cleaning (see Nevada) -- then water can be sold at a loss because it supports something else, and is sustainable so long as there a mechanism to keep it being so. The problem in Michigan is that the other way to pay for it isn't working, and the government doesn't have the revenues or a profit model to keep it going otherwise. Again, this would be true whether the government were capitalist, socialist, socially democratic, totalitarian or anything else. Economics are true whether or not your ideology agrees, but it shouldn't be controversial to assert that trying to sell luxury goods to Liberia (the poorest area in the world, last I checked) is fruitless, it should be easy enough to replace "luxury goods" with "water", or any other product and still be true.
  - macawfish 10y ago
    I hear you saying that in Nevada, clean water is [economically] sustainable because of [gambling]. But I'm talking about ecological, biological sustainability, insofar as human life is concerned. So yeah, I'm dodging your financial model of sustainability altogether, intentionally, because in this case my entire ideological basis is irreconcilable with your model. water is not a product in my religion, as it is in yours