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Where does the funding for new infrastructure come from? Hospitals? Public services such as police or firefighters? Libraries, if your town has any? Or how abou

Where does the funding for new infrastructure come from? Hospitals? Public services such as police or firefighters? Libraries, if your town has any? Or how about schools? This money comes from the federal government, gets distributed down to the state level which then gets distributed out to the various cities and localities depending on need [1]. A lot of these towns are given grants or loans from the USDA in order to fund various improvements [2]. [1] https://www.governing.com/topics/finance/gov-state-budgets-federal-funding-2015-2018-trump.html https://www.governing.com/topics/finance/gov-state-budgets-f... [2] https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/7/1/my-journey-from-free-market-ideologue-to-strong-towns-advocate https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/7/1/my-journey-from...

JoeAltmaier 7y ago
We build our own in Iowa. Not sure how that works elsewhere. We build our excellent secondary road system (access to every section in Iowa for agricultural purposes). We build our hospitals. Our library was a local bond issue. And our schools! A new bond issue every few years for schools for a growing population. And lets forget the myth that 'federal funding' is free, or come from somewhere else. It comes from us.
- fzeroracer 7y ago
  Federal funding mostly comes from the states with the highest economic activity. Unless you're disputing that states with higher number of individuals and economic activity doesn't correlate with more taxes paid to the federal government. And on the iowa website itself [1] I can see the grants and federal funding used by the state government. My point being that if the more rural cities were required to pay for everything themselves, they would not be able to. [1] https://iowadot.gov/transit/funding-programs-and-applications/funding-programs https://iowadot.gov/transit/funding-programs-and-application...
Zenst 7y ago
That can in many parts of the World yield a bit of a chicken and egg combined with the - if you build it - they will come approach. Though in most, it's supply and demand and TAX distribution according to that populous. Even in cities you will see poorer area's subsidies by more affluent area's, though that is not always the case and opens up a whole area of have and divide politics and economics. But it gets down to local experience and equally the country for people, so one perspective can seem complete polar to another's experience.

JoeAltmaier 7y ago

We build our own in Iowa. Not sure how that works elsewhere. We build our excellent secondary road system (access to every section in Iowa for agricultural purposes). We build our hospitals. Our library was a local bond issue. And our schools! A new bond issue every few years for schools for a growing population. And lets forget the myth that 'federal funding' is free, or come from somewhere else. It comes from us.

fzeroracer 7y ago
Federal funding mostly comes from the states with the highest economic activity. Unless you're disputing that states with higher number of individuals and economic activity doesn't correlate with more taxes paid to the federal government. And on the iowa website itself [1] I can see the grants and federal funding used by the state government. My point being that if the more rural cities were required to pay for everything themselves, they would not be able to. [1] https://iowadot.gov/transit/funding-programs-and-applications/funding-programs https://iowadot.gov/transit/funding-programs-and-application...

Zenst 7y ago

That can in many parts of the World yield a bit of a chicken and egg combined with the - if you build it - they will come approach. Though in most, it's supply and demand and TAX distribution according to that populous. Even in cities you will see poorer area's subsidies by more affluent area's, though that is not always the case and opens up a whole area of have and divide politics and economics. But it gets down to local experience and equally the country for people, so one perspective can seem complete polar to another's experience.