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Your first link claims that city services are increasingly more reliant on tax revenue than non-tax revenue to pay the bills. Two immediate reasons for the incr

by bmer 9y ago

Your first link claims that city services are increasingly more reliant on tax revenue than non-tax revenue to pay the bills. Two immediate reasons for the increased reliance on tax revenue: 1) Seattle is using "public private partnerships", and outsourcing some public services to private companies, which overcharge them, increasing city expenditures, 2) city revenue that isn't tax based isn't growing to keep up with the city's needs, because revenue streams probably come from fines which are meant to help enforce a particular law, rather than create a sustainable revenue source, so naturally over time, the tax revenue increasingly provides funding for city services. Provide me with data that shows that both 1) and 2) are not the case. Your second link is just a big "data dump" and doesn't point me to the relevant facts, so I'll just share what I saw out of it: tax revenue is growing, even though tax rates aren't being increased. So, amongst other factors, this is likely due to population growth. This actually makes the opposite point of what you want to make. Your third link does nothing to connect the homeless problem to the increases in tax rate. Show me that homelenessness spikes each time tax rates are increased. It's really a pretty simple graph I am asking for. You provided no evidence for other points I raised, and the evidence you did provide were for mostly for questions I did not ask. In my first post, I clarified that I want data that shows cause and effect you claim: increases in tax rates (not revenue!) => increases in city spending => increases in homelessness Grade: fail. Off to the gulag with you.

conanbatt 9y ago
According to http://openbudget.seattle.gov/#!/year/default http://openbudget.seattle.gov/#!/year/default 2013: 4.32Billion 2014: 4.72Billion 2015: 5.14Billion 2016: 5:41Billion 2017: 5.71Billion Tax revenue is increasing enormously. > Your second link is just a big "data dump" and doesn't point me to the relevant facts, so I'll just share what I saw out of it: tax revenue is growing, even though tax rates aren't being increased. So, amongst other factors, this is likely due to population growth. This actually makes the opposite point of what you want to make. My point is that increasing taxes is not the way to solve poverty. Increasing tax rates is a proxy to leevying taxes, its not meaning per se. Its not that if you tax 40% you have poverty and if you tax 41% you have equality. What matters is how much money is taking and how much is given from top top bottom. But lets say we want to talk only in percentages. Its not about the legal increase of rates, its about the effective rate. Seattle gathers most of its income with property taxes, which, even with the tax rules unknown to me, have to have been increasing with the increase of prices of land and properties, I'm confident. To the very least, it shows in the revenue. > ou provided no evidence for other points I raised, and the evidence you did provide were for mostly for questions I did not ask. In my first post, I clarified that I want data that shows cause and effect you claim: increases in tax rates (not revenue!) => increases in city spending => increases in homelessness I did not say that increasing tax rates increases homelessness. I said increasing taxes does not necessarily decrease homelessness. SF and Seattle are examples of increased revenue (and effective rates, considering income and prop taxes respectively) and increasing homelessness. So to the one that says that a steeper progressive taxation will reduce poverty, I shall answer nay.

by bmer 9y ago

conanbatt 9y ago

According to http://openbudget.seattle.gov/#!/year/default http://openbudget.seattle.gov/#!/year/default 2013: 4.32Billion 2014: 4.72Billion 2015: 5.14Billion 2016: 5:41Billion 2017: 5.71Billion Tax revenue is increasing enormously. > Your second link is just a big "data dump" and doesn't point me to the relevant facts, so I'll just share what I saw out of it: tax revenue is growing, even though tax rates aren't being increased. So, amongst other factors, this is likely due to population growth. This actually makes the opposite point of what you want to make. My point is that increasing taxes is not the way to solve poverty. Increasing tax rates is a proxy to leevying taxes, its not meaning per se. Its not that if you tax 40% you have poverty and if you tax 41% you have equality. What matters is how much money is taking and how much is given from top top bottom. But lets say we want to talk only in percentages. Its not about the legal increase of rates, its about the effective rate. Seattle gathers most of its income with property taxes, which, even with the tax rules unknown to me, have to have been increasing with the increase of prices of land and properties, I'm confident. To the very least, it shows in the revenue. > ou provided no evidence for other points I raised, and the evidence you did provide were for mostly for questions I did not ask. In my first post, I clarified that I want data that shows cause and effect you claim: increases in tax rates (not revenue!) => increases in city spending => increases in homelessness I did not say that increasing tax rates increases homelessness. I said increasing taxes does not necessarily decrease homelessness. SF and Seattle are examples of increased revenue (and effective rates, considering income and prop taxes respectively) and increasing homelessness. So to the one that says that a steeper progressive taxation will reduce poverty, I shall answer nay.