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A Complete Guide To The Ponzi Scheme That Is Suburban America (businessinsider.com)
19 points by wyclif on Oct 9, 2011 | hide | past | favorite | 2 comments


I see lots of graphs. These graphs have money on one axis, and time (many years' worth) on another axis. Are these graphs adjusting for inflation, and how? It is impossible to draw a meaningful conclusion from these graphs in the absence of this information.

Does the fact that we're using overpriced union labor for most of our infrastructure projects contribute to this problem? Maybe reducing the costs could be more effective than raising taxes?

I appreciate the "unsustainable spending" angle but it sounds like they're restricting their focus to the suburbs, possibly because they don't like the suburbs. (There is a lot of suburb-hate in urban-planning circles. I don't like suburbs either, but I'm not convinced that this hate leads to sound policy perscriptions.) How about a meaningful comparison to ridiculous wastes of money in urban projects? I'm thinking like New Jersey and the $9 billion tunnel to Manhattan. I'm sure there are plenty of others like this. Or intercity projects (cough high-speed rail cough).


> it sounds like they're restricting their focus to the suburbs, possibly because they don't like the suburbs

Or because tax density per foot of road is more of a problem in suburban or rural areas. There's a good reason half of Vermont is still dirt or gravel.




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