
Philip Greenspun Visits Berkeley - rglovejoy
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/2010/01/10/visit-to-berkeley-california/
======
lutorm
About Berkeley's poverty rate, it doesn't seem like he considered that just
like rich people can move to other states, poor people can move too. Maybe the
poverty rate of Berkeley is high precisely because it's better to be poor in
Berkeley than in Oakland or Emeryville? When a city cuts down on social
services, they are just externalizing the costs onto neighboring communities.

I know that Santa Cruz was trying to get rid of its reputation as "a good
place to be homeless in" exactly because homeless people from all over the Bay
Area came there.

~~~
jdvolz
This is exactly why the population of homeless people is so high. It's always
high near a university, and it's especially high in a city where the homeless
are borderline actively encouraged - the city even fought the university on
tearing down a park to build more student housing (note: university owns the
land) because too many people were living in it.

------
dasht
As one small point, Greenspun waxes eloquent about the "big government"
stupidity of the Berkeley Tool Lending Library.

Well, what is the Berkeley Tool Lending Library? It's a couple of sheds and
some low-hours guys there taking care of the equipment. We got wheelbarrows,
we got various small power tools, we got rotor tillers, we got tree pruning
equipment, some ladders, etc. Lots of people benefit but, by eye, I'd say the
main beneficiaries are homeowners who otherwise would have to buy under-used
equipment from Home Depot or hire a contractor. The budget is freaking small.
The social benefits (including bottom-line contribution to the local economy)
is freaking huge. He's talking through his hat on that point, at the very
least.

~~~
rglovejoy
What happens when someone gets injured or killed because he or she was
improperly using a tool from the tool lending library? What if the low-hours
guys you mentioned were cutting corners on the tools' upkeep? Or is this
really an issue?

I don't think that Philip is opposed to the idea of a tool lending library, he
is merely questioning why the City of Berkeley needs to be running it. Why
can't a group of citizens form a cooperative to do this, instead of involving
the city government?

~~~
count
The city government IS a cooperative formed by the citizens of the City of
Berkeley.

~~~
frognibble
A cooperative is a group of people united voluntarily. A city is not voluntary
(yeah, you can move. but it's not always possible or convenient until we have
seasteading).

~~~
joubert
City residence IS voluntary. Very much unlike country citizenship, which, for
practical purposes is involuntary for the vast majority of (non-European)
people.

~~~
tome
What do you mean? Country citizenship is not voluntary for EU citizens either.
Did you mean country residence?

~~~
joubert
In practical terms, citizenship does not restrict residency in Europe for
Europeans.

------
timr
_"I pointed out that California collects a larger percentage of its citizens’
income than all but five other states (10.5 percent; source). Shouldn’t it be
possible to run the state on 10.5 percent of income?

Despite the fact that all of my interlocutors had university educations,
sometimes including PhDs, all were so deeply invested in the idea that their
insolvent state government is starved for revenue that they were unable to
parse the information."_

Perhaps they were just stunned that someone with a PhD doesn't know that
income tax isn't the whole story?

California state revenue, 2009: $88 Billion (source:
[http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/pdf/BudgetSummary/SummaryCharts.pd...](http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/pdf/BudgetSummary/SummaryCharts.pdf),
chart SUM-01)

California population: 36.8 million (July, 2008; source: US Census)

CA Revenue per capita: $2391.30

Texas state revenue, 2009: $78 Billion (source:
<http://www.cpa.state.tx.us/taxbud/bre2008/BRE_2008-09.pdf>, page 3)

Texas population: 24.3 million (July, 2008; source: US Census)

TX Revenue per capita: $3209.88

"Conservative" Texas takes in almost a thousand bucks more per person in taxes
and fees than does "liberal" California.

UPDATE: I made a mistake. The numbers for Texas are reported on a biennial
basis, whereas for California, they're reported on an annual basis. See my
reply to cwan below for details. When you get the annual numbers from the
Texas budget summary, they appear to take in about 32% less per capita than
California.

~~~
houseabsolute
I'm afraid you are incorrect. The link you put for California is just the
general fund, which does not include special funds, bond funds, or federal
funds like the Texas one does. After you add those in, California's count is
$208 billion in 2008-2009. See this for more:
[http://www.dof.ca.gov/budgeting/budget_faqs/information/docu...](http://www.dof.ca.gov/budgeting/budget_faqs/information/documents/CHART-B.pdf)

Edit: I should say though, right on for pointing out the material issue. You
got the meat of it right in that it's overall spending that matters, not just
income tax. You "showed your work" correctly, you just plugged in the wrong
numbers. That means you get an 8/10 from me.

Edit2: I read the parent's post too quickly in my haste to make a point.
However, neither of us considered the contribution of local taxes, as
discussed below. I believe that that definitively answers the question of
which state spends more per capita.

~~~
emmett
And after you add them in for Texas, it's $158 billion. You're comparing
apples and oranges.

Additionally, timr was correct to restrict his numbers to state tax revenue,
which is the total under discussion.

If you do the math, it comes out to $6,500 per person in Teaxs, and $5,600 per
person in California. So even considering the other sources of revenue (though
it makes no sense to do so in this context), timr's point is still correct.

~~~
cwan
Apparently still not true. Have a look here (California State Per Capita
Revenue numbers) 2010E - State: $4015; State+Local: $9050
[http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/CA_per_capita_revenue.htm...](http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/CA_per_capita_revenue.html)

and here (Texas State Per Capita Revenue numbers) 2010E - State: $2980;
State+Local: $7041
[http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/TX_per_capita_revenue.htm...](http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/TX_per_capita_revenue.html)

These tie better back to the US Census numbers (which are only as at 2004 but
are on an apples-apples basis): <http://www.census.gov/govs/state/04rank.html>

The problem is that states do not report revenues in the same ways and some
are clearly more creative than others.

~~~
timr
Yes, there's a problem with my original post; no, it's not related to federal
transfers -- it's correct to exclude them from the calculation. The problem is
that Texas (bizarrely) allocates its budget on a biennial basis. I didn't read
the documents closely enough, and had assumed that 2009-2010 meant fiscal
2009-2010. Oops.

From the same Texas source, table A-12, the estimated total state revenue is
$39.3 Bn for fiscal 2009. Thus, the per-capita revenue numbers for fiscal 2009
would be $1,617.30, versus $2,391 for California. So, I'm wrong. Texas takes
in about 32% less per capita than California.

~~~
gojomo
It's not that bizarre they budget biennially -- when you consider that the
Texas legislature is part-time, and meets only every other year.

Given the eternal train-wreck that is California budgeting -- even in good
years, they just give away the store in future obligations (like public
pensions) that make the bad years twice as bad -- fewer, longer budgets might
be a good idea here as well.

~~~
timr
AFAIK, the biggest problem with California budgeting is the initiative-driven
pre-allocation of huge amounts of money that would otherwise be discretionary
income. Pensions may play a part, but not nearly to the extent claimed by
certain partisan interest groups.

------
100k
I think it's clear that the problem with California is not the taxation rate
(which after all at 10.5% is not much higher than the national average of 9.7%
and ranks only 6th) but rather that the entire state government is incredibly
broken.

A big portion of the state's revenues are constitutionally mandated to go to
certain programs via the ridiculously easy referendum process.

Meanwhile, Proposition 13 requires a 2/3rds majority vote to pass any sort of
budget, and a hardened radical element in the Assembly would rather see the
state go down in flames than raise taxes (even when coupled with spending
cuts).

I think the very short term limits (3 terms) for assembly members feeds this
tendency because they don't have enough time to get good at legislating and
compromising before being kicked out of office.

At the same time the (vast majority) Democrats in the assembly don't want
massive spending cuts -- but you must admit they have the majority! A 2/3rd
requirement to pass a budget is incredibly undemocratic.

The result is unrestricted borrowing and inevitable collapse.

------
gabrielroth
Suggested subhed: 'Foolish Californians fail to recognize obvious superiority
of writer's free-market views, invite him to dine with lesbians.'

------
lutorm
I've always thought Greenspun's articles were interesting and well written, so
I'm disappointed to see such a transparently ideological and sarcastic
article.

~~~
pchristensen
Really? It seems like at least 4 out of every 10 Greenspun posts are
transparently ideological and sarcastic.

~~~
lutorm
Maybe it's because I've mostly read the ones about flying?

~~~
pchristensen
True, I subscribe to his blog and it's about 40% sarcastic ideology, 30%
aviation, and 30% commentary and book reviews. Usually only articles from the
3rd category get posted here.

------
tallpapab
Move over Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin. The right has a new hero and it's ...
Phil Greenspun? Who knew!?

Now Phil is surely much smarter than I. No argument there. I would never have
the confidence to go to Harvard and try to straighten out the PhDs there about
how Massachusetts should be run. They would call me names like Carpetbagger
and such.

Where does Phil get his 10.5% tax rate number? From the Tax Foundation
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_Foundation>. Where do they get their
numbers? It's vague. Does it include sales tax and workman's comp etc.? The
same foundation complains about California Corporate tax burden being the
highest in the nation at an outrageous 8.3%. Hmmm. 8.3 < 10.5. And don't give
me any of that trickle down baloney about not taxing corporations.

Pensions are a great boogie man of the right wing. They cost so much. It's
much cheaper to stop paying those folks. If they haven't amassed fortune
enough to retire using that huge 40k salary by now, tough luck.

I had better stop now before I get all worked up. After all I'm just a dumb
old computer programmer who doesn't know much about economics. Phil's a s m a
r t old computer programmer ...

Sigh. I'm actually a bit of a fan of Phil's. It's just that the harsh
conservative position is hard for an unemployed 50+ programmer to swallow
these days. I don't have a "fat" pension. When I go for interviews I rarely
see anyone over 40. Good luck to you all, and don't look down on us "over the
hill" workers. Just look away.

------
ytinas
"None could accept the idea that their state had a spending problem rather
than a revenue problem"

"For roughly 60 years, Berkeley has offered more services to its residents
than virtually any other city in the U.S."

This should point out to him his mistake, I would think. He is assuming that
the correct answer is to lower taxes (or keep them the same) and spend less.
But this isn't a correct (or wrong) answer, it is one option. Maybe people in
California would rather pay higher taxes and get more services. It works
pretty well for a lot of European countries.

------
krakensden
I've never seen someone so bitter about California weather.

------
tmsh
One sentiment people in Berkeley would seem to share, however, is that they'd
rather be naive about helping people than naive about being critical.

~~~
dschobel
The argument is that the mismanaged spending and high taxation rate are
actually pernicious to the community's welfare, this isn't just a matter of
cynical reflex saying "look at those do-gooders thinking they're making a
difference".

~~~
tmsh
But the argument hints that they are missing the big picture by, as you claim,
'mismanaged spending and [a] high taxation rate'. My point is that it's better
to miss the big picture while helping people, than to miss the big picture
while criticizing people.

Greenspun visits Berkeley for maybe 3 or 4 days and he's now quite sure that
people there have it wrong? He mentions Prop 13 in passing, as something that
everyone in the East Bay keeps on talking about. Some might argue it's a much
bigger issue than he realizes. Far from over-taxation being a problem, it
would be that California has not taxed based on real property values for
decades. I.e., Greenspun has side-stepped a large problem in the bigger
picture by being hyper-critical.

Perhaps I'm overreacting, but I was just getting a little tired of Greenspun's
hints that there is a problem with being naive about 'doing good' -- as you
mention (quite well said, that is sort of how I read Greenspun's attitude). My
point was to hint that there is also a problem in taking one's 'cynical
reflex' too seriously.

After all, these actions, at a certain level, are really kind of similar
movements. Hyper-taxation and hyper-criticism both attempt to optimize at the
wrong time, too impatiently. However, in the former case, at least someone
gets helped (though arguably by being critical Greenspun is helping
eventually). At any rate, I don't think what he says is completely incorrect.
There's just a flip side to it. E.g., in any sufficiently large Lisp program,
a lot of time is spent in FFI.

------
jacoblyles
Do California residents get a greater than average amount of services for all
their taxes?

~~~
artsrc
That is an interesting question, but I don't think it is the right one.
California can innovate and do better. Where there is waste it may be worth
eliminating, even if it is a below average amount of waste.

If you are talking about federal taxes, then the answer is certainly yes.
Californian's pay a lot more in federal taxes than they receive in services
from the federal government relative to other states. This may be related to
the fact that they have less federal senate votes per resident than most
states.

Does incarcerating someone count as a service? California has a large prison
population. I would argue that significantly as a result of federal drug
policies.

The article was pretty light on the detail of where the money goes.

------
wandermatt
His anecdote about Macintosh repair costs is excellent. Case closed,
Californians, you should have gotten Dells.

------
iamelgringo
Philip is so right. The Bay area stinks. Every body should move to Texas or to
Boston where life is so much better. Real estate prices are way too high. The
politics here are way to liberal. The government is way out of touch with
what's realistic. The whole state is going to collapse any day underneath its
own weight.

</looks through San Jose real estate listings>

