4 ms·

10 billion can't do any of those things. If it could, we'd have them. California's gdp is 3,000 billion. They make that every year. This is 10 billion over a d

10 billion can't do any of those things. If it could, we'd have them. California's gdp is 3,000 billion. They make that every year. This is 10 billion over a decade.

barbazoo 3y ago
> 10 billion can't do any of those things Has CA actually spent that money on those problems and shown that it couldn't solve them? If not I don't think that statement is true?
- manwe150 3y ago
  $10 billion is roughly $6 per homeless person per year in California. How much are you expecting this one free cup of coffee per quarter to accomplish?
  - Filligree 3y ago
    They have a billion homeless people?
  - sdenton4 3y ago
    Are you saying that there are 42 million homeless people in California? (10B / $6 / 4 quarters / 10 years) Edit: fwiw, assuming 115k homeless in California (which incidentally is 1/3 of the US total), we get $2,170/person per quarter over ten years. Which does sound like enough to make a real difference in people's lives if you just handed it out.
    - manwe150 3y ago
      Oops, yeah, that was a calculator fail. It should have been about $6k/year, but I dropped a factor of 1k. Which is still not much, but a bit more sensible.
  - boeingUH60 3y ago
    Wow, there are 1.7 billion homeless people in California?!
- lukeschlather 3y ago
  The (current) upper bound on the cost of building a high-speed rail line from SF to LA is nearly $100 billion. https://hsr.ca.gov/about/capital-costs-funding/ https://hsr.ca.gov/about/capital-costs-funding/ A statewide light rail system would probably run closer to a trillion dollars. They could probably do the statewide light rail for $100 billion if private property rights were ignored. But $10 billion doesn't sound plausible. Maybe just the single already planned line could be built for $10 billion, if private property were ignored and the state did good planning.
  - wongarsu 3y ago
    To be fair, light rail is cheaper to build than high-speed rail. And if we are going to fantasy-land where the government can do things for the public good without caring about who it inconveniences right now, they could build light rail on land "the government" already owns: in cities dedicate lanes to public transit (as in light rail + bus), to go between cities take some highway space. Rail has much higher capacity than cars, so if you get public transit right this should actually decrease traffic after it's built. Of course this makes it obvious why California can't do it for $10 billion, $100 billion or even $10 trillion: wherever you put your rail network it will inconvenience someone, and that causes massive delays and cost overruns, or makes the project politically untenable from the start. Even if you put the rail underground you would get massive protests from nearby residents because "poor people" can now get there easier.
andrepd 3y ago
> 10 billion can't do any of those things. If it could, we'd have them. How does that follow? There's plenty of reasons why there's no high speed rail in the US, none of them have to do with lack of money.
- TheBigSalad 3y ago
  Good point, there are many reasons on top of the lack of money. Especially for the homeless issue.

10 billion can't do any of those things. If it could, we'd have them. California's gdp is 3,000 billion. They make that every year. This is 10 billion over a decade.

barbazoo 3y ago

> 10 billion can't do any of those things Has CA actually spent that money on those problems and shown that it couldn't solve them? If not I don't think that statement is true?

manwe150 3y ago
$10 billion is roughly $6 per homeless person per year in California. How much are you expecting this one free cup of coffee per quarter to accomplish?
- Filligree 3y ago
  They have a billion homeless people?
- sdenton4 3y ago
  Are you saying that there are 42 million homeless people in California? (10B / $6 / 4 quarters / 10 years) Edit: fwiw, assuming 115k homeless in California (which incidentally is 1/3 of the US total), we get $2,170/person per quarter over ten years. Which does sound like enough to make a real difference in people's lives if you just handed it out.
  - manwe150 3y ago
    Oops, yeah, that was a calculator fail. It should have been about $6k/year, but I dropped a factor of 1k. Which is still not much, but a bit more sensible.
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  Wow, there are 1.7 billion homeless people in California?!
lukeschlather 3y ago
The (current) upper bound on the cost of building a high-speed rail line from SF to LA is nearly $100 billion. https://hsr.ca.gov/about/capital-costs-funding/ https://hsr.ca.gov/about/capital-costs-funding/ A statewide light rail system would probably run closer to a trillion dollars. They could probably do the statewide light rail for $100 billion if private property rights were ignored. But $10 billion doesn't sound plausible. Maybe just the single already planned line could be built for $10 billion, if private property were ignored and the state did good planning.
- wongarsu 3y ago
  To be fair, light rail is cheaper to build than high-speed rail. And if we are going to fantasy-land where the government can do things for the public good without caring about who it inconveniences right now, they could build light rail on land "the government" already owns: in cities dedicate lanes to public transit (as in light rail + bus), to go between cities take some highway space. Rail has much higher capacity than cars, so if you get public transit right this should actually decrease traffic after it's built. Of course this makes it obvious why California can't do it for $10 billion, $100 billion or even $10 trillion: wherever you put your rail network it will inconvenience someone, and that causes massive delays and cost overruns, or makes the project politically untenable from the start. Even if you put the rail underground you would get massive protests from nearby residents because "poor people" can now get there easier.

andrepd 3y ago

> 10 billion can't do any of those things. If it could, we'd have them. How does that follow? There's plenty of reasons why there's no high speed rail in the US, none of them have to do with lack of money.

TheBigSalad 3y ago
Good point, there are many reasons on top of the lack of money. Especially for the homeless issue.