Nailing It
Economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has developed into one of the more incisive analysts of our politics; more specifically, Krugman takes on the "politics of greed" in a way that exposes the tactics and gives insight into the motives of the powers transforming our nation into one with gross inequality and falling real median incomes.
Read this excerpt and begin to see how it applies to our own situation in New Albany. As I see it, the problem with our city is a recurring failure to invest in the future. Far too many people want to preserve what they have, to lock in the status quo ante, cross their fingers, and hope for the best. But above all, don't DO anything.
New Albany and Floyd County can no longer afford to wait to invest in the future. For too long, we have abdicated our responsibility and made investments only at the point of a (judicial) gun. As for discretionary investments designed to bootstrap our local economy and transform NA from a fading backwater of Metro Louisville...well, you see the do-nothing faction at work right now.
Another local commentator likened the city to a family that, when faced with a tight budget, must take a second or third job to make ends meet. The creation of revenue streams is the job of the city. Good stewardship involves much more than collecting and spending fixed revenues. It requires investments that increase those revenue streams.
Scribner Place is precisely one of those investments. Opponents, including both those who are acting out of ignorance and those who are political opportunists, rail that the city's investment will result in an increase in property taxes. The exact opposite is true. While property taxes are certain to rise, this investment in the city's future will enhance the delivery of city services while limiting the tax increase. It will generate new revenues and allow the city to provide more services at a lower relative cost. Without it, and future projects like it, property taxes will rise and rise and rise, driving some of its opponents out of our city because they will no longer be able to afford to live here.
On the larger national scale, Krugman identifies part of the problem. See if you recognize any of the "partisans" he addresses. The link is active, if you want to read the entire article online.
Losing Our Country
...Since 1980 in particular, U.S. government policies have consistently favored the wealthy at the expense of working families - and under the current administration, that favoritism has become extreme and relentless. From tax cuts that favor the rich to bankruptcy "reform" that punishes the unlucky, almost every domestic policy seems intended to accelerate our march back to the robber baron era...
...It's not a pretty picture - which is why right-wing partisans try so hard to discredit anyone who tries to explain to the public what's going on...
...These partisans rely in part on obfuscation: shaping, slicing and selectively presenting data in an attempt to mislead. For example, it's a plain fact that the Bush tax cuts heavily favor the rich, especially those who derive most of their income from inherited wealth. Yet this year's Economic Report of the President, in a bravura demonstration of how to lie with statistics, claimed that the cuts "increased the overall progressivity of the federal tax system...."
...The partisans also rely in part on scare tactics, insisting that any attempt to limit inequality would undermine economic incentives and reduce all of us to shared misery...
...Above all, the partisans engage in name-calling. To suggest that sustaining programs like Social Security, which protects working Americans from economic risk, should have priority over tax cuts for the rich is to practice "class warfare." To show concern over the growing inequality is to engage in the "politics of envy..."
---------------------------------------------------------
Randy Smith, destinations@sbcglobal.net
Read this excerpt and begin to see how it applies to our own situation in New Albany. As I see it, the problem with our city is a recurring failure to invest in the future. Far too many people want to preserve what they have, to lock in the status quo ante, cross their fingers, and hope for the best. But above all, don't DO anything.
New Albany and Floyd County can no longer afford to wait to invest in the future. For too long, we have abdicated our responsibility and made investments only at the point of a (judicial) gun. As for discretionary investments designed to bootstrap our local economy and transform NA from a fading backwater of Metro Louisville...well, you see the do-nothing faction at work right now.
Another local commentator likened the city to a family that, when faced with a tight budget, must take a second or third job to make ends meet. The creation of revenue streams is the job of the city. Good stewardship involves much more than collecting and spending fixed revenues. It requires investments that increase those revenue streams.
Scribner Place is precisely one of those investments. Opponents, including both those who are acting out of ignorance and those who are political opportunists, rail that the city's investment will result in an increase in property taxes. The exact opposite is true. While property taxes are certain to rise, this investment in the city's future will enhance the delivery of city services while limiting the tax increase. It will generate new revenues and allow the city to provide more services at a lower relative cost. Without it, and future projects like it, property taxes will rise and rise and rise, driving some of its opponents out of our city because they will no longer be able to afford to live here.
On the larger national scale, Krugman identifies part of the problem. See if you recognize any of the "partisans" he addresses. The link is active, if you want to read the entire article online.
Losing Our Country
...Since 1980 in particular, U.S. government policies have consistently favored the wealthy at the expense of working families - and under the current administration, that favoritism has become extreme and relentless. From tax cuts that favor the rich to bankruptcy "reform" that punishes the unlucky, almost every domestic policy seems intended to accelerate our march back to the robber baron era...
...It's not a pretty picture - which is why right-wing partisans try so hard to discredit anyone who tries to explain to the public what's going on...
...These partisans rely in part on obfuscation: shaping, slicing and selectively presenting data in an attempt to mislead. For example, it's a plain fact that the Bush tax cuts heavily favor the rich, especially those who derive most of their income from inherited wealth. Yet this year's Economic Report of the President, in a bravura demonstration of how to lie with statistics, claimed that the cuts "increased the overall progressivity of the federal tax system...."
...The partisans also rely in part on scare tactics, insisting that any attempt to limit inequality would undermine economic incentives and reduce all of us to shared misery...
...Above all, the partisans engage in name-calling. To suggest that sustaining programs like Social Security, which protects working Americans from economic risk, should have priority over tax cuts for the rich is to practice "class warfare." To show concern over the growing inequality is to engage in the "politics of envy..."
---------------------------------------------------------
Randy Smith, destinations@sbcglobal.net
posted by All4Word at 9:07 AM
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