SAJ-99
Well-known member
You going for my title of HT Bleeding-heart Liberal?
Federal Land Sales for Affordable Housing?
- Thread starter Big Fin
- Start date
Nameless Range
Well-known member
Don't wanna derail things,but I definitely write what I write from the perspective of a local who views a large piece of geography as "Home".
I live adjacent to a giant abandoned pit - one of the largest in Montana. The owner gone bankrupt and left a few hundred acre hole in the ground that in all likelihood the taxpayers of Montana will deal with for decades to come. My kids attend one of the nicest schools in Montana, the same as I did, and my friend parents had good jobs that paid well - all on the backs of the mine. That said, one of the few extractive industries that doesn't seem to have a cycle of boom and bust, existence and wane, is tourism.
My observation is that tourism, unlike mines/timber/oil, only grows, and where those other things can certainly raze the lovely and cause acute losses to a Home, none cause such a widespread dissolution of that which locals love and live for, like Tourism. Over time, it erases the local - their interests in government, their experiences in the world, and their economic well-being.
All a balance of course, but I never see the advocates for that industry pumping the brakes.
Wildabeest
Well-known member
It’s an upgrade from “Commie bastard”.
SAJ-99
Well-known member
Recent NYT article about Jackson WY.
I will try to free share the article. Let me know if it works or doesn't.
I will try to free share the article. Let me know if it works or doesn't.
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Straight Arrow
Well-known member
Does NOT.
Laszlo Cravensworth
Well-known member
SAJ-99
Well-known member
I attached a new link and hard doc. It's a long article so a bit of a mess.
Worked for me too
Straight Arrow
Well-known member
Got it.
elkduds
Well-known member
Hypothetical town, East Jesus, (any rural western locale). It originated to meet some business need for European immigrants. Rail hub, river port, housing and services for mining or even a company town, supply center for surrounding ag/timber/mining, fort for military, etc. Next it is a locus for immigrants coming to settle the West. There weren't that many industries to attract immigrants: mining, timber, ag, probably in roughly that order. The only ag that really worked in the arid and largely unlevel mountain west was/is grazing: cattle, sheep, horses, llamas, yaks. That ag employs very few individuals compared to mining and logging.
All these pilgrims arrive to attend the extractive industrial booms our West is built on. Booms go bust, some move on to the next shiny location, some say there is enough here to keep us. But we need to make a living. We can get the government to create jobs through colleges/universities, prisons, highway construction and maintenance, big ass Reclamation projects like hydroelectric reservoirs, even post offices. Once there is a critical mass of residents retail, banking, professional services like medical and legal, schools, even auto and truck repair. Construction will be profitable as long as we keep attracting new residents. And visitors, to float these rivers, boat and fish the reservoirs, hunt the mountains, even slide down them in winter if we adapt mining tech to haul them up the mountain.
Because East Jesus is in a more pleasant setting than the nearby Big Towns, we can find enough workers for our postal, educational, professional and other jobs. After a few generations, some of our local children will stay to work the family ranch, take over the postmaster job from dad, the bank, the grocery store, the construction company, the college administration if they leave to further their education.
The nearby big towns have grown much faster than East Jesus. They have military bases, manufacturing, newfangled airports and interstate highways, universities, regional hubs for mining including oil/gas, lumber and other building materials, finance, insurance, retail distribution, specialized medical and other professional services, construction and trades conglomerates because of their consistent, often rapid growth, government. Lots more $ to go around in Big Towns. Some of those many people from Big Town have enough $ to take time off, and get away to East Jesus, where life seems less hectic. What they don't see is the challenge of financially surviving where there are less and smaller bank accounts. Even in East Jesus, more people means more $. Attracting those people becomes the most viable way of growing the glacial economy.
They like our natural beauty and solitude, we'll build roads and campgrounds. Many don't camp, we'll build hotels and restaurants. Some like to gamble, we can cover those bets. Things in East Jesus slowed considerably when the mines shut down and the logging ended, so most of the $ went elsewhere. In order to build for growth, we need outside $. It will only come if it can make it's own rules. Sadly, those are different than the ones locals developed over generations of making life work in EJ. $ needs executives to preserve it, and government to plow the fields for it to grow.
This is getting too long to read, but you can see where it is going. Modern economies are based on growth, not subsistence or steady states. Without bonds, compounding interest, commercial credit, reasonable expectation of growth of investment, tourism can't compete. So it relies on low cost labor and services, and attempts to extract monetary value from formerly nonmonetary assets like rushing rivers, snowy mountains, giant herds of wildlife, dark skies, solitude and quiet. To the detriment of those nonmonetized, surprisingly finite intangibles.
The next part of this, if you or I choose to add to it, is the struggle to survive in Paradise.
All these pilgrims arrive to attend the extractive industrial booms our West is built on. Booms go bust, some move on to the next shiny location, some say there is enough here to keep us. But we need to make a living. We can get the government to create jobs through colleges/universities, prisons, highway construction and maintenance, big ass Reclamation projects like hydroelectric reservoirs, even post offices. Once there is a critical mass of residents retail, banking, professional services like medical and legal, schools, even auto and truck repair. Construction will be profitable as long as we keep attracting new residents. And visitors, to float these rivers, boat and fish the reservoirs, hunt the mountains, even slide down them in winter if we adapt mining tech to haul them up the mountain.
Because East Jesus is in a more pleasant setting than the nearby Big Towns, we can find enough workers for our postal, educational, professional and other jobs. After a few generations, some of our local children will stay to work the family ranch, take over the postmaster job from dad, the bank, the grocery store, the construction company, the college administration if they leave to further their education.
The nearby big towns have grown much faster than East Jesus. They have military bases, manufacturing, newfangled airports and interstate highways, universities, regional hubs for mining including oil/gas, lumber and other building materials, finance, insurance, retail distribution, specialized medical and other professional services, construction and trades conglomerates because of their consistent, often rapid growth, government. Lots more $ to go around in Big Towns. Some of those many people from Big Town have enough $ to take time off, and get away to East Jesus, where life seems less hectic. What they don't see is the challenge of financially surviving where there are less and smaller bank accounts. Even in East Jesus, more people means more $. Attracting those people becomes the most viable way of growing the glacial economy.
They like our natural beauty and solitude, we'll build roads and campgrounds. Many don't camp, we'll build hotels and restaurants. Some like to gamble, we can cover those bets. Things in East Jesus slowed considerably when the mines shut down and the logging ended, so most of the $ went elsewhere. In order to build for growth, we need outside $. It will only come if it can make it's own rules. Sadly, those are different than the ones locals developed over generations of making life work in EJ. $ needs executives to preserve it, and government to plow the fields for it to grow.
This is getting too long to read, but you can see where it is going. Modern economies are based on growth, not subsistence or steady states. Without bonds, compounding interest, commercial credit, reasonable expectation of growth of investment, tourism can't compete. So it relies on low cost labor and services, and attempts to extract monetary value from formerly nonmonetary assets like rushing rivers, snowy mountains, giant herds of wildlife, dark skies, solitude and quiet. To the detriment of those nonmonetized, surprisingly finite intangibles.
The next part of this, if you or I choose to add to it, is the struggle to survive in Paradise.
BigHornRam
Well-known member
I remember the phrase the billionaires are kicking out the millionaires in Jackson Hole, back in the 90's. This is nothing new. The NYT has finally figured this out!
SAJ-99
Well-known member
And you kept the news to yourself for 30 years! Thanks.
Wildabeest
Well-known member
Sounds like the lyrics to another song as well…
Then came the churches, then came the schools
Then came the lawyers, then came the rules
Then came the trains and the trucks with their loads
And the dirty old track was the Telegraph Road
Then came the mines, then came the ore
Then there was the hard times, then there was a war
Telegraph sang a song about the world outside
Telegraph Road got so deep and so wide
Like a rolling river
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It's not 'lazy' to "let the market sort itself out", that's how a free market is designed.
People who believe this mischaracterization are quick to panic. Politicians and those who fund them feed off this uninformed panic to raise taxes, pass bills for handouts, and intensify polarization so land sales appear as the only solution.
Alternatively,
"...once the answer becomes a [tax] the answer to every future problem will be a [tax]."
This was my gut reaction. Weaponized empathy for the teachers, fire, law, etc. to deal with the devil and give away our lands is a terrible strategy.
Doesn't the government create handouts with a tax? The tax vs. handout may be a chicken or egg issue, but they both originate from each other. Additionally, subsidies also come from that chicken.
Just because they called it an ACA subsidy did not make it a subsidy, but a handout. Since no specific performance metric was attached to that subsidy, it was a handout.
Subsidies should incentivize initial growth and then expire once the target project sustains itself. An additional tax (like a bridge tax) may be created or a temporary tax incentive, but shut down once it gets legs.
Subsidies that keep a broken system alive are handouts. Handouts are poison. If you are going to put a toll booth to pay for a bridge, shut it down after the bridge is paid for. A problem you run into here is that politicians keep the temporary tax & handout solutions alive, create malaise and dependency, and then use the money for things it wasn't intended for.
I agree, when you raise taxes, the middle class and wealthy 'find a way' at first. Then they leave and/or shelter their taxes elsewhere. California and NY are the poster children of what happens when you raise taxes too much.
Good article. Just because Wyoming cuts property taxes doesn't give them a pass to weaponize empathy from the Federal Govt to whine about unaffordable housing.
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True, it is certainly a mix of Socialism and Capitalism.
SAJ-99
Well-known member
For one side, yes. For the other, the tax just becomes a future handout. Hard to tell the two apart these days.
I generally agree with a lot of your points. You can't tax or cut taxes to prosperity. You can't give money away for forever, to people or corporations. There has to be balance. I have said many times, two reasonable people can probably find a reasonable solution, even if they start out in different spots. We drifted from putting reasonable people in charge a while back.
Taxes are meant to incentivize behaviors (and maybe get economist to argue about the potential future behaviors to win prizes for papers and such). They are generally considered both carrot and stick. We tax tobacco and alcohol because we want people to use less of it (they didn't) but we justified it to help offset the HC costs incurred later in life by those that did. Most people would think that is a reasonable approach - heck even ID taxes the snot out of tobacco. LOL.
In this specific case of Jackson, taxes are too low. The billionaires are building another school just for themselves. The county can't pay enough to hire garbage collectors. Maybe let the billionaire throw the garbage in the back of the $150,000 range rover and take it to the dump themselves? It's WY so taxes are the Boogieman. Real estate taxes are meant to provide for public services. It is pretty clear the billionaires want the services for themselves and let the working class worry about the rest of it. The real American dream.
I know there is a huge bias against CA and NY on HT, but you might want to check the stats. Those two states are doing perfectly fine with higher GDP growth than TX and FL and the overall US last report. If you are talking about the outflow of rich people somehow hurting the economy, I say let them leave. The inflow of rich people isn't helping Teton county. At some point, the new people moving in extracts more in resources from the economy than they pay in. Teton is discovering that and looking into a response to maybe cut taxes more? I think there is a general misunderstanding that is spreading of what the total economy is and how it works.
Straight Arrow
Well-known member
And it has worked pretty well for several decades ... until some uber wealthy Johnny-come-latelies who were bestowed with the vast wealth their family had acquired, then thinking they are the smartest people ever to be born, began buying politicians or becoming politicians and began the ruination of the system.
