urbanSTL

Ebsy wrote:I feel like this should be renamed the "St. Louis City Deathwatch Thread."

Implemented in 1959, the city earnings tax was there just in time to witness the St. Louis "glory years" of the 1960s - 1980s. One could argue that the earnings tax STARTED the Deathwatch.

At this point though, the tax is akin to a benign cancerous tumor that is impossible to safely remove from the body.

With 1 in 50 residents on the city payroll it's going to be tough to beat.

I voted no but I'm generally OK with the tax. There has to be some push back otherwise we give them an inch and they will take a mile.

It would be easier to phase out with a growing population. However, with at least 25 years of the "back to city" movement in America behind us, general exploding global population, and a 1000 miles of open borders St. Louis still can't add people.

Meanwhile, Corpus Christie is poised to pass St. Louis in population meaning that if St. Louis were in Texas it would be the 9th largest city in Texas.

^ Corpus Christi is 460 sq miles- about 300 is water but lets see where STL City would be at 160Sq miles of land

about the double in population of CC is where it would be.




Also the City has all top 9 largest city in texas beat by about 1400 people per squre mile...

STL- 5157/sq mile

Houston 3600/sq mile
San Antonio 3000/sq mile
Dallas 3645/sq mile
Austin 3345/sq mile
Fort Worth 2181/sq mile
El Paso 2500 sq/mile
Arlington 3800/sq mile
Corpus Christi 1900sq mile

Good info. Of course, I pretty much knew this already as most people do.

We just love to use the County to pump up our population numbers, make our schools look good, and drive down our crime stats. Other than that they are a bunch of a**holes. Being such an integral part of the City, maybe the County should get a chance to vote on the earnings tax.

If there was a merger would the County vote on the earnings tax?

jsbru wrote:Redistribution of wealth only works if it goes to either directly enhance services/income to the poor, or to enhance the society as a whole. If it goes to greasing the palms of an incompetent bureaucracy, you might as well just stack a pile of $100 bills into a pyramid and start a bonfire.

Still better than throwing it away on bond interest

leeharveyawesome wrote:Good info. Of course, I pretty much knew this already as most people do.

We just love to use the County to pump up our population numbers, make our schools look good, and drive down our crime stats. Other than that they are a bunch of a**holes. Being such an integral part of the City, maybe the County should get a chance to vote on the earnings tax.

If there was a merger would the County vote on the earnings tax?

this isnt about using the counties population...other places do the same thing, but theirs is "official" since their city boarders arent capped at 62 sq miles. the Clayton in Dallas or Brentwood in Dallas doesn't have a city hall its just another Soulard or St.Louis Hills.

and per sq mile isnt using any county numbers.

leeharveyawesome wrote:Good info. Of course, I pretty much knew this already as most people do.

We just love to use the County to pump up our population numbers, make our schools look good, and drive down our crime stats. Other than that they are a bunch of a**holes. Being such an integral part of the City, maybe the County should get a chance to vote on the earnings tax.

If there was a merger would the County vote on the earnings tax?

No, if the city is annexed and remains a city, the city will vote on the earnings tax. If a larger merger is done, the earnings tax would go away unless it's done under a constitutional amendment that says the new unified gov't can have one. Note I'm not a legal scholar.

Fun fact the plan Civic Progress considered int he 80s included a 1% earnings tax for the county.

Would an earnings tax in the county be worse than the damage of the sales tax chase and the traffic ticket tax?

leeharveyawesome wrote:, maybe the County should get a chance to vote on the earnings tax.

i don't get to vote on county sales tax or when brentwood raises it sells tax or chesterfield...and i just paid a chesterfield sales tax this morning when i got a coffee there before work...

leeharveyawesome wrote:If there was a merger would the County vote on the earnings tax?

WHAT? Did Clayton residents vote on the Ferguson sales tax ballot issue last night? do all county residents vote on individual city issues within st.louis county?

Without regard to whether it's actually beneficial or not, a lot of childless people just got their property taxes raised yesterday to pay for early childhood education (or as it used to be known as "mom and dad").

I don't mean to make all tax issues some sort of "pay for what you will personally get" situation. I'm just pointing out a few things to think about.

I have no children nor do i plan to have any time soon but i can think a bit outside the box to see how better educated city children and better city schools benefits me and everyone else that's childless.

Northside Neighbor wrote:

Don't get me wrong, I despise Siquenfield and all he stands for, but I also doubt the majority of the income from the earnings tax is actually being put to good use. I wonder what percentage of it is lost to graft, incompetence, sweetheart contracting deals, and/or fraud/embezzlement.

Redistribution of wealth only works if it goes to either directly enhance services/income to the poor, or to enhance the society as a whole. If it goes to greasing the palms of an incompetent bureaucracy, you might as well just stack a pile of $100 bills into a pyramid and start a bonfire.

Some mighty big words. Care to provide any specifics?

Implying corruption without any evidence or good reason to suspect it is all the rage these days.

Hey man, I'm just throwing over to first base to keep the runner close. The crowd might boo but if you don't then they will steal second then steal third and then home and all of a sudden you are losing because you weren't paying attention.

leeharveyawesome wrote:Hey man, I'm just throwing over to first base to keep the runner close. The crowd might boo but if you don't then they will steal second then steal third and then home and all of a sudden you are losing because you weren't paying attention.

Yup. It's healthy to pinch yourself now and then. Wake up and take a critical look at the forest, and, the forest over time.

jsbru wrote:I wonder what percentage of it is lost to graft, incompetence, sweetheart contracting deals, and/or fraud/embezzlement.

Perhaps I'm naive or just too optimistic, but I like to believe the percentage lost to graft, sweetheart contracting and/or fraud/embezzlement pales in comparison to the amount lost to good ol'fashioned incompetence. And the amount lost to incompetence, probably pales in comparison to the amount lost to bureaucratic inefficiencies.

Seriously, there's a lot of ways in which City government could be run better, fairer and more efficient. If you focus too much on the limited amount of intentional malfeasance on the fringes, you'll miss the chance to identify and push for actual systemic changes.

south compton wrote: Perhaps I'm naive or just too optimistic, but I like to believe the percentage lost to graft, sweetheart contracting and/or fraud/embezzlement pales in comparison to the amount lost to good ol'fashioned incompetence. And the amount lost to incompetence, probably pales in comparison to the amount lost to bureaucratic inefficiencies.

Seriously, there's a lot of ways in which City government could be run better, fairer and more efficient. If you focus too much on the limited amount of intentional malfeasance on the fringes, you'll miss the chance to identify and push for actual systemic changes.

I agree. I'm willing to bet the amount squandered on people's salaries who come in to work every day, but get absolutely nothing done probably pales in comparison to the amount that's actually lost to graft/embezzlement.

That's true at any organization, public or private, large or small.

If people on here ever get the pleasant opportunity of having personal business with the city to get done (perhaps they already have), they'd realize that there's nobody home.

south compton wrote:
Perhaps I'm naive or just too optimistic, but I like to believe the percentage lost to graft, sweetheart contracting and/or fraud/embezzlement pales in comparison to the amount lost to good ol'fashioned incompetence. And the amount lost to incompetence, probably pales in comparison to the amount lost to bureaucratic inefficiencies.

Seriously, there's a lot of ways in which City government could be run better, fairer and more efficient. If you focus too much on the limited amount of intentional malfeasance on the fringes, you'll miss the chance to identify and push for actual systemic changes.

That's a really beautiful thing. Well done.

south compton wrote: Seriously, there's a lot of ways in which City government could be run better, fairer and more efficient. If you focus too much on the limited amount of intentional malfeasance on the fringes, you'll miss the chance to identify and push for actual systemic changes.

I'm guessing "indiscriminately chop the budget in half" is not one of the ways to make the government run better. All those incompetent city officials will certainly turn into financial geniuses who can squeeze blood from a turnip if we just pressure them hard enough.

MarkHaversham wrote:

south compton wrote: Seriously, there's a lot of ways in which City government could be run better, fairer and more efficient. If you focus too much on the limited amount of intentional malfeasance on the fringes, you'll miss the chance to identify and push for actual systemic changes.

I'm guessing "indiscriminately chop the budget in half" is not one of the ways to make the government run better. All those incompetent city officials will certainly turn into financial geniuses who can squeeze blood from a turnip if we just pressure them hard enough.

You've just stumbled into a great idea Haversham! Maybe we should get some financial geniuses down at City Hall!

Serious question, though. Do people think Detroit is going to recover more quickly or more slowly due to declaring bankruptcy? I'm betting the answer is "more quickly."

That doesn't mean it's totally fair. Bond creditors and employee pensions took a haircut, and that's legitimate money that people lost. But does the benefit of the city's more rapid rebirth cancel that out?

Detroit's situation is almost incomparable to ours' at this point. Despite all of our struggles, we've made some good financial decisions over the years and are nowhere near as over-leveraged at Detroit was. Bankruptcy would make zero sense for St. Louis, and would probably only damage our reputation further.

leeharveyawesome wrote: You've just stumbled into a great idea Haversham! Maybe we should get some financial geniuses down at City Hall!

The city would probably have to raise taxes to afford their salaries in the short-term, though.

jsbru wrote:Serious question, though. Do people think Detroit is going to recover more quickly or more slowly due to declaring bankruptcy? I'm betting the answer is "more quickly."

That doesn't mean it's totally fair. Bond creditors and employee pensions took a haircut, and that's legitimate money that people lost. But does the benefit of the city's more rapid rebirth cancel that out?

Note that Detroit's bankruptcy included features like being put under an emergency manager, i.e. the same program Flint can thank for their lead-laden water. There is a lot of uncertainty around what a bankruptcy could mean, particularly given Missouri's anti-city attitude. It might mean state support for reducing obligations. It might instead mean selling off Forest Park and city government buildings to the highest bidders.

^ the NO on E campaign said it will next work on developing a plan to replace the E tax and it will present it to the city leaders for implementation.

dbInSouthCity wrote:^ the NO on E campaign said it will next work on developing a plan to replace the E tax and it will present it to the city leaders for implementation.

That sounds like something they should've done before the election.