Can't afford it

[BruceBowker]

Here is a question not designed to start an argument or huge political debate but something that I have tried to understand.

 

Why is it that communities can no longer afford anything? When I grew up in a small town of only 1200 people we had 2 police, now none. Can't afford it. Schools can't afford more teachers and even have to cut back in many areas including teachers. Roads can not afford to be repaired. Yet I remember none of these problems in the 1950's, even perhaps '60's to '70's. Swimming pools close. Can't afford to keep them open. Recreational parks can not afford to stay open or keep maintained. General repairs on bridges etc. Too expensive. The list seems endless. What went wrong and why?

[Mondo]

I think you'll find that local government provides a lot more services than they did back then. New technology has spawned I.T. departments and other services that weren't around back then.

Some of it is unfunded or partially funded mandates sent down from the State or Feds. Some of it was voted in by local residents. Furthermore, there's more environmental regulations (at least in California). Over the years, pay and benefits of government employees has grown more (or more accurately, has not been cut as bad as private employees).

In California, the State took control from local government of education, gas taxes etc.. when Prop 13 was passed in the 70s. This gave them more control over local government and gave them a pot of money to "borrow" from, resulting in local government being raided to bail out the State.

My two cents

[MHKflyer52]

Here is a question not designed to start an argument or huge political debate but something that I have tried to understand.

 

Why is it that communities can no longer afford anything? When I grew up in a small town of only 1200 people we had 2 police, now none. Can't afford it. Schools can't afford more teachers and even have to cut back in many areas including teachers. Roads can not afford to be repaired. Yet I remember none of these problems in the 1950's, even perhaps '60's to '70's. Swimming pools close. Can't afford to keep them open. Recreational parks can not afford to stay open or keep maintained. General repairs on bridges etc. Too expensive. The list seems endless. What went wrong and why?

 

I would have to say that I have often completed the same thing until I remember that a gallon of milk was under a dollar and was delivered to the house by the milkman who work for the local diary and a loaf of bread was some were around a quarter and also delivered to your house until it became to expensive to pay for the insurance and maintance of the delivery trucks and to pay for the insurance and the drivers pay all because technology at the time was as simple as making the manufacturing process quicker and cheaper and the fact that big business started putting more products on shelf of large stores and such so the small business cannot be competitive with large corporations.

It is called inflation and greed of the people including me as I like money and what it can provide.

 

I think you'll find that local government provides a lot more services than they did back then. New technology has spawned I.T. departments and other services that weren't around back then.

Some of it is unfunded or partially funded mandates sent down from the State or Feds. Some of it was voted in by local residents. Furthermore, there's more environmental regulations (at least in California). Over the years, pay and benefits of government employees has grown more (or more accurately, has not been cut as bad as private employees).

In California, the State took control from local government of education, gas taxes etc.. when Prop 13 was passed in the 70s. This gave them more control over local government and gave them a pot of money to "borrow" from, resulting in local government being raided to bail out the State.

My two cents

 

Have to agree with you that inefficient government has also contributed to all of that especially here in the BROKE STATE OF CALIFORNIA.

 

Just my belief or as some say my two cents which does not get you a lot in today’s economy.

[BruceBowker]

"I think you'll find that local government provides a lot more services than they did back then"

 

I imagine it does it some areas, but when I look at the small towns in my area where I grew up, I don't see any increase in services at all. Seems either about the same or perhaps less since, once again, they can't afford it all.

 

Here is another question. When I went to high school, we were absolutely not allowed to drive to school. Now that high school has a HUGE parking lot filled with the cars and trucks of students. It is my understanding that the school must provide enough bus seats for all students. I think someone with an IQ of 100 would see that is a HUGE waste of money. Why aren't these things stopped? If you want to drive than you fill out a form saying you do not require a bus seat and cut the number of buses to what is needed I am guessing that up to 40 % could be eliminated. That is a huge savings. Are other schools the same?

 

I hear people complain about the waste of money in all kinds of areas and it seems everyone agrees but nothing gets done to stop it.

[powderbrake]

Growth of Government, growth of entitlements, assumptions that there are "rights" to all sorts of freebies from the government.

[gjslutz]

Jerry, I'm with you 100%. Those of us who pay for this are small in number, as to those who feel it is free to them.

Gary

[slngsht]

the problem is partly what the government does, but mostly how it does it.

 

our school district has a 1.12 Billion dollar operating budget. CONSTANTLY short on money. But they pay $1000 per desktop for the classroom in their "negotiated" contract, which is absolute BS for a piece of crap computer. Look at the grounds crew for the park service, and see their pace of work compared to the illegals that work private yard companies. The illegals work 100 times harder. There are countless examples of this at EVERY level.

[BusaNostra]

Here is a question not designed to start an argument or huge political debate but something that I have tried to understand.

 

Why is it that communities can no longer afford anything? When I grew up in a small town of only 1200 people we had 2 police, now none. Can't afford it. Schools can't afford more teachers and even have to cut back in many areas including teachers. Roads can not afford to be repaired. Yet I remember none of these problems in the 1950's, even perhaps '60's to '70's. Swimming pools close. Can't afford to keep them open. Recreational parks can not afford to stay open or keep maintained. General repairs on bridges etc. Too expensive. The list seems endless. What went wrong and why?

 

 

Too much government interventions. Police, fire and the rest of the dirty unions. Municipal operating budget cost is unsustinable due to hi-cost of everything (contractors(services) - oil - gasolines - lumber - steels food etc. etc. etc.

Even the air you breath is too expensive because of that fabricated environmental global warming fraud.

 

then...Add the gazillion healthcare cost obamacare passed at the middle of sunday night.

The unborn children will be paying for their school. The cost of abortions & illegal aliens healthcare is yours too.

 

Historic bill they claimed? I say historic corruptions, fraud, gymnastic maneuver and

disregarding the constitutions.....more bills to come.

Edited March 22, 2010 by BusaNostra

[Mondo]

Busa,

Do you have young kids? Thank the unions they can go to school instead of work.

Weekends off? Overtime pay? Do you think most large employees would provide medical/retirement benefits if not for Labor's influence? Do you really want comparable wages to 3rd world countries? How will your children pay for healthcare then? The amount Republicans say Obamacare will cost is still less then the trajectory of premium increases we've been seeing from the insurance companies.

 

If you really want to live in a Libertarian country move to Somalia... no taxes, no roads, no schools, just pay for your own protection and services, don't count on anyone else sharing costs ... you can really enjoy your freedom there.

 

Dude, there's middle ground on all these issues (services, cost & debt). We just need to ignore the rhetoric from the extreme right and left. We need to be looking at reasonable solutions instead of constantly finding fault (which is the easiest thing to do).

[BusaNostra]

We both have our opinions: I don't need the union to improve myself unfortunately

you do. I don't believe in entitlement.

 

However, this one is not an opinion:

If you didn't PUKE how OBAMA corrupted the system, I don't know what kind are you. This is not magic.

Right between your eyes how OBAMA did the gymnastic to pass the bill.

I hate big govenment. I don't want my government telling me to buy a health insurance and go to jail if I don't.

 

I feel pain everytime I think of those soldiers who died for this country.

Edited March 23, 2010 by BusaNostra

[slngsht]

let's keep it focused on the original topic. I really enjoy civil debate and hate stepping in to lock topics.

[BusaNostra]

let's keep it focused on the original topic. I really enjoy civil debate and hate stepping in to lock topics.

 

 

Oh yeah? get real --- if you want to talk about high cost, do you have money to pay for

the healthcare program? This ain't your tinnie winnie municipal budget.

[GBOLT]

Because this is the off topic section, why lock it? Let grown men have a discussion, when they begin to act like children, then step in. I for one find the entire section interesting, and enjoy reading different views. I just ask all of us remain respectful of each other.

[slomove]

......I just ask all of us remain respectful of each other.

 

Yes, but that is the point. I find Busa's comment already offensive to the degree of right wing bullshit. It may be his opinion but as it is there are different ones.

 

If we can boil it down to civilized (if disagreeing) debate we should continue. If it gets to aggressive argumentation or hate rhetoric we should stop.

Edited March 23, 2010 by slomove

[slngsht]

Because this is the off topic section, why lock it? Let grown men have a discussion, when they begin to act like children, then step in. I for one find the entire section interesting, and enjoy reading different views. I just ask all of us remain respectful of each other.

because people get carried away - and everybody comes here to enjoy sevens first, and some light hearted , interesting posts in OT. We've had a few posts in OT that have been really civilized discussions on current events, but more often than not, these threads start going down hill for one reason or another.

[slngsht]

Oh yeah? get real --- if you want to talk about high cost, do you have money to pay for

the healthcare program? This ain't your tinnie winnie municipal budget.

why are you quoting me about cost of healthcare? :lol:

[GBOLT]

Slomove,

 

I agree there were some comments earlier that did not add to the discussion.

[BruceBowker]

I really did not want to start bitter arguments. Just wondered what people thought about the fact that there now and has been for quite a few years, never enough money to do things when in the 1950's and even 1960's I never heard anyone comment about this. Towns had polcie, but now can not afford them. Towns repaired roads but now...

[Kitcat]

Bruce:

 

I am from Meadville, a small town in western PA. When I was a kid (late 40's-early 60's) this town of about 14K people was booming. Now it's a shell.

 

What happened? First, the two largest factories shut down taking 6000 jobs and all the related secondary jobs. Good for Mexico/China, bad for PA.

 

Second, strip malls opened just out side of town with big box stores (Walmart, etc) selling things (from China) for a fraction of what the once thriving concentration of mom and pop stores in the town charged. So the business heart of the town was gutted and the tax base migrated to just out side the city limits.

 

Now they cant operate the traffic lights (stop signs are replacing them) or fix their bridges, etc., etc.

 

It's pretty grim there with a future that is murky at best.

 

Mike

Edited April 2, 2010 by Kitcat

[MightyMike]

From my perspective as a Federal government employee and senior manager, local unions drive up the cost of doing day-to-day business. They bicker and put up a fuss on piddly crap as simple as moving a coffee pot from one corner of the room to another. I'm not kidding. They claim moving the coffee pot is a change in working conditions. This is how good government unions have it (at least where I work). I'm sure that when working conditions were originally addressed in the collective bargaining agreement it meant taking an employee from an office envioronment and putting him into a warehouse or something like that.

 

Also from what I've observed, productivity from our union members is just plain minimal at best. Their pay compared with outputs is far greater than just about anything you will see in the private sector. This cuts into our bottom line and drives up costs.

 

I'm not really in favor of pushing out unions from our government, but I believe we should force them into living up to both sides of the collective bargaining agreement and not wasting time and money arguing things that shouldn't be argued.

 

Anectdotally, I believe the problems that I observe on a daily basis may be representative of many other Federal, state, and city unions. Maybe I'm wrong, but in the end, I am convinced unions are a significant part of the waste and higher costs passed onto tax payers.

 

Having said this, I completely agree that the level of services provided by our government is the chief reason for most of our governmental funding challenges.