Loading ...Roads Require New Taxes?
February 20th, 2008One of Nevada’s transportation experts was profiled in the Las Vegas Sun today.
Here’s what I don’t understand:
- Taxes have only gone up in my adult lifetime.
- Tax revenue has gone up even more, because many more people live here today than did yesterday, every day, since I moved here in the early 1970s.
- Why is our existing, ever-increasing tax revenue so far behind our road needs (or police needs, or school needs, as each genre of government service has its own crowd of advocates claiming poverty)?
There are only a few possible logical answers:
- Government services do not “scale” - ie it takes 1.6 social workers per thousand residents to handle 2-million citizens, but only 1.5 social workers per thousand residents to handle 1-million citizens, because more citizens demand more services. (I have never seen any research supporting that citizens have an inherent increase in per-capita service requirements based on the largeness of the group).
- Government growth generates more and more inefficiency the larger it becomes, and at a rate faster than the government growth itself. If inefficiency grows faster than the underlying government service grows, less and less work gets done with more and more money. Solutions include:
- Become more relentless in finding and eliminating inefficiency
- End Nevada’s experiment with supersized government and convert our few giant governments into more smaller governments
- or throw up your hands and increase taxing and spending even faster than the rate of inefficiency growth in order to keep government service growth at the same pace as population growth.
- Or, the advocates for higher taxing and spending are falsely passing off new and expanded government services as “just keeping up.” We know this is an effective legislative technique as we saw in the 2003 legislative session.
February 20th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
Look at the facts:
Las Vegas is reportedly LOW ON WATER. A 23 Percent increase was just grated as well as a 50 Percent increase in Delivery System costs!
In a recent election/voting cycle there was an INCREASE of .25 Percent in Sales Taxes for Police Service INCREASE! Now, another is being asked for and the First One has not increased Police Services in any equitable amount!
The Mayor of Las Vegas is constantly trying to attract professional sports teams to Las Vegas. WHY? This will requiirw more infrastructure and MORE TAX INCREASES on the RESIDENTS!
Developers, Casinos, Major Hotels and the like are PROFITING from the sports contests, conventions, and entertainment being offered, not the residents. WE ARE being asked to ‘foot the bill’ for their right to profit! We are asked to curtail water use as Developers build more housing and buildings to INCREASE the NUMBERS of CONSUMERS! The businesses are to whom we must look for any needed money. The Police Services, roadways, sewage pipeline and treatment, water lines and water are REQUIRED for their PROFITS! Not ours!
With the number of residences added in the last 10 years compared to the LACK of additional infrastructure, to add anything new would be like adding another string of lights to a Christmas tree already BURDENED with light bulbs with an electrical circuit already blowing fuses from overuse!
Titus wants to oust you from office to allow MORE TAXATION! Our Sheriff wants more TAXES! When will it end?
If Titus and her ilk have anything to do with it…IT WILL NEVER END!The true answer is to TAX THE CASINOS MORE!
February 20th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
Canada should be Nevada’s role model.
In Canada they pay…..
sales tax 13%
High local property taxes
Special taxes…like $100 for each air conditioning unit in a house
If you make $75,000 a year you pay 26% in Federal Income Tax and another 16% in State income tax…..total 42%.
$1.20 per gallon gas tax (US dollars)
I am sure that if we paid these taxes that most of the newspapers and government people would be shouting….WE NEED MORE TAXES!!!!!!!!
February 21st, 2008 at 10:50 am
The REAL reason the tortoise beat the hare:
- the hare relied on the recommendations of a government-sponsored panel of road racing experts appointed by harry reid and headed by tom skancke.
- the tortoise, conversely, used the resources available and its own free will.
61
February 23rd, 2008 at 8:55 am
Your questions get to the crux of the problem with government and government services.
I believe part of the problem is a disconnect between what full time government employees consider priorities and what the non-government employee citizenry expects in return for their tax dollar.
Decisions by government officials to do anything in a democracy are by definition, difficult at best and impossible at worst; because we govern by consensus. Doing something requires general agreement by 50-percent plus one of the citizenry. To obtain conceptual agreement mandates an endless number of fact finding hearings, committee meetings and research justifying whatever expenditure is anticipated to do the “public good.”
Many government officials and full time employees believe they are providing public service by accomplishing the “process,” rather than end the product of whatever it is the citizenry is expecting, i.e., new highway, football stadium, etc.
When government employees are focused on process, this lead to claims of needing ever larger staffs, offices and hearing rooms to “gain consensus,” rather than finding more cost-effective means for delivering the products and services requested by the tax payers in a shorter time frame.
To this mix, one can then add the effect of government unions and the delays brought about by the trial lawyers and it becomes a true wonder that we get anything accomplished at all.
February 23rd, 2008 at 8:56 am
Taxes, Taxes, Taxes! All we here from government is MORE TAXES!
I bet that the State of Nevada also has a few assets (see the state’s CAFR for more details)
When I have money problems I have had to sell off some of my assets, why not the state?
February 23rd, 2008 at 6:24 pm
Larry is moving down the right path. I was able to observe this both from the outside and from the inside. Here is what I saw (and continue to see):
1. The main objective of Government “services” is to keep those who provide those services in a paycheck.
2. People who do not have to directly pay for these “services” do not really care how much they cost or how good they are provided.
3. People rarely conduc effective persecution of inefficiencies when they are inconvenienced. The vast majority of the time, they just want to whine.
4. The best way to handle people whining is to just let them continue.
5. Inefficiency only produces more paychecks for government service providers. To Government, inefficiency is good.
6. Government is able to thrive in direct proportion to how much of your earned capital they can heist.
7. True freedom comes from people making their own choices. I am as charitable as anyone, I just do not like my charity handed out in areas I do not agree with so people I do not respect can get the credit and continue in their government service jobs.
8. Labels mean nothing. Hard work, respect for your fellow man, and a healthy division of self responsibility and altruism to support society are all that mean anything. Taxes take this freedom away from you.
9. Ambitious people are driven by personal responsibility and providing goods and services people need. Taxing them reduces their incentive to continue this. Lazy people are driven on dependance on others. Giving them money for no productive effort reduces their incentive to continue being lazy. Every dollar we launder through Washington, therefore, is providing a double disincentive to improve society.
10. The only thing politicians care about is their power-broker jobs. No change can happen unless you get them out of their jobs. Rotate the officials through. It is the only way to survive. Just do it.
Remember, there is not one politician that places society above their job. If they did, they would spend their wealth, not yours, to fix things.
February 29th, 2008 at 11:18 pm
Relax Bob….Ms. Taxus is paying you the best political compliment of the year…”Lets get rid of Beers and We can tax Nevada to the hilt”!!!!!WOW! and that is coming from a Political Science Professor!!! I think I got it now….Mebbe, we’re lucky she ain’t in the Business Administration Curriculum. So,,it sorta behooves the Cognoscenti in the Beers Senate district to make sure the “Nemesis of Taxus” is RE-elected…I don’t like being PROTECTED by only ONE vote….so my/our work is cut out for next election…(It also doesn’t say much for the Spenders n th Senate) ….