Economic Realities
ByTwo very thoughtful opinion pieces in the AC-T today. The first is from Jim Buchanan and features this quote from Glenn Greenwald,
“Does anyone doubt that once a society ceases to be able to afford schools, public transit, paved roads, libraries and streetlights — or once it chooses not to be able to afford those things in pursuit of imperial priorities and the maintenance of a vast Surveillance and National Security State — that a very serious problem has arisen, that things have gone seriously awry, that imperial collapse, by definition, is an imminent inevitability?”
This second piece is from the editorial board, and it recognizes the stark reality of our local economic situation. Click here to read the whole thing. Here’s a trenchant quote:
More affordable housing would be a boon to the regular folk who teach in our schools, fight crime in our neighborhoods, fight fires in the community, care for our sick and elderly in hospitals and nursing homes.
4 Comments
August 15th, 2010 at 9:22 am
The suffering of American cities was outlined last week by the Guardian.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/aug/13/us-cities-massive-publc-services-cuts last week.
One remedy, before cutting services, might be to explore the free ride non-profit, non-tax paying institutions get. How much do, for instance, UNCA and Mission Hospital pay for services received paid for by Asheville taxpayers?
The idea is examined here:
http://www.afscme.org/issues/6401.cfm
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August 15th, 2010 at 10:54 am
Re-considering property tax exemption on all the local non-profits…would be a start. Then add in the tax exemption of those who live here for six months, then go back to their permanent homes, is another glaring resource.
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August 15th, 2010 at 6:05 pm
Don’t leave out Jason’s piece featuring these quotes:
“Welcome to the party, pal.”
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August 16th, 2010 at 12:22 am
I find the bipartisan tendency to conflate ‘society’ with government disheartening. Society is an aggregate of individuals not the structures that presume to dominion over those people. As to the decline of the types of ‘public goods’ inventoried above, the failure of these services should, to any sensible person, indicate a failure on the part of the provider of thoe services, to be capable and competent. Perhaps its time to admit that they might not actually be the logical purview of the government. They’ve screwed it up long enough (their profound inability to provide basic education alone should be enough to encourage people to seek alternative service providers, and does).
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