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Suburbs pay city taxes but are basically subsidized owing to the infrastructure cost relative to tax rate. You can hardly chalk the problem to too few people li
by slothtrop 4y ago
Suburbs pay city taxes but are basically subsidized owing to the infrastructure cost relative to tax rate. You can hardly chalk the problem to too few people living within the city boundaries, but ultimately for super-long commuters what it would mean is the bulk of shouldering the cost of those people falls on the communities outside the city. People go in to work, that means the amenities used are a) the roads which have to be maintained anyway, and b) power in the city center which the corporate office pays for (and they pay property tax).
The infrastructure cost for inefficient sprawled out areas is enormous. A money pit.
- jeffbee 4y agoSuburbs are not the only place that can’t fund their street maintenance. My city of Berkeley, California, only spends a fraction of what would be required and we have the worst pavement quality in the state. What’s needed is a frontage tax: $10/foot/year on each parcel ($400/year for typical parcel size and shape). That would fix the streets in perpetuity. It’s politically impossible though since people who live in single-family detached homes, who are massively subsidized by apartment dwellers, don’t want to lose that subsidy.