4 ms·
Perhaps not Somali civil war level failure, but taxes keep going up while government keeps becoming more ineffective. Government concern for personal safety and
by e4e78a06 5y ago
Perhaps not Somali civil war level failure, but taxes keep going up while government keeps becoming more ineffective. Government concern for personal safety and property keeps going down.
I personally no longer feel safe going outside my $3000/mo apartment after dark despite being a tall man because there are mentally deranged homeless who, quite literally, roam the streets attacking vulnerable people (my wife was assaulted by one and police didn't care), and frequent reports of robbery at gunpoint. Prices in stores in downtown are 2x what they are in nice suburb areas an hour's drive away because of unprosecuted theft. It is literally cheaper for me to _order Instacart and tip a driver_ than it is to purchase from local grocery stores.
And what are my elected politicians doing during this time? Sending out emails to their constituents about "mitigating inequity" in how roads are resurfaced and renaming manhole covers.
- pueblito 5y ago$3,000 a month apartment surrounded by homeless people feels like a serious income distribution problem
- gruez 5y agoLetting law and order go down in flames is going to make it worse. The rich can easily afford private security, poor people can't. See also: south africa.
- rexkwondo 5y ago
- e4e78a06 5y agoSan Francisco spends over $50k/year per homeless person and has the worst homeless problem in the nation. More money is not going to help. We need state power and willingness to forcibly commit heroin/meth addicts and mentally deranged people to institutions.
- akomtu 5y ago
- pvarangot 5y agoSo I should pay more than 50% in taxes? If the California+federal tax rate was 35% for me or something I could have already retired. I think I distribute my income fairly and I can't even vote in this country even though I am a permanent resident and pay taxes like every other American. The problem is the government is an inefficient black hole of money, I also pay around 3k in rent but live in a nice neighborhood but the only way to do that in San Francisco that I'm aware of is by renting a 8k condo with roommates. I have an activist history in Argentina but after about a year of trying to find a group that's doing something I feel identified with in San Francisco to tackle what I believe are the cities problems, the only groups I found have basically been getting a decent salary from the government for them and their friends and whatever is they are doing is clearly not working. I don't want to start naming names and discussing policy because it just doesn't go anywhere. I just really really really don't think this is an income distribution problem, it looks like one, I believed it was that three years ago, I tried to understand it better and do something, and now I think it's not. It's that "the homeless" are the justification for a useless bureaucracy that's in the best case not really changing anything and in the worst is going to make it worse in the long term, all by living off half of every software engineers income that we are already forced to redistribute.
- inetknght 5y ago> So I should pay more than 50% in taxes? Well, yes. But more than that, you should stop electing shitacular government officials. Otherwise it's going to be so unprofitable for you to not be in government. Once you're in government then you might as well just fix the problem yourself.
- teakettle42 5y ago> > So I should pay more than 50% in taxes? > Well, yes. Can you explain why you think he should spend more than four hours a day, every day, working entirely for someone else’s benefit?
- ink404 5y agoNot for someone else's benefit, but for the benefit of their entire city/state/country.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]