America's short term problem is obvious but its long term problem, I suspect, is that Reagan paid for a tax cut by stopping infrastructure investment and now nobody still of working age remembers what maintenance actually costs. It's now politically unthinkable to tax enough that government departments can run efficiently, that schools are properly resourced, that the line at immigration is quick, that bridges are properly inspected and maintained.
@tef yup. The danger there is collossal⦠if federal funding for all of those otherwise bankrupt cities suddenly dries up we're going to have a lot more Detroits on our hands very quickly indeed.
@goatsarah up, it goes for the UK just as well, and I'm pretty concerned about it. For a brief beautiful moment it looked like Scotland might make a break for it, but I guess that moment has passed. Not that I'm well enough to go running around moving to other coutnries anymore.
Portugal: If there's a problem, someone comes out overnight, cones off a section of road, and fixes it.
UK: 50mph speed limit for 18 months whilst government spaffs money to private contractors who don't actually fix the damned thing for 18 months, but their CEO went to Oriel with the transport minister, or some shit.
For a thread labelled "musing" I really don't know which way to take this, really. I think the only way forward is to get people to understand that individualism is broken, but so far I've only seen that really come out when people are coordinating to deal with a crisis rather than when they're asked to, I don't know, spend a bit of money on making sure that all the kids in the school district actually eat. Perhaps all it takes is to set an example and wait.
tef
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tef
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i don't mean white flight, i mean smartcitiesdive.com/ex/sustainβ¦
literally, suburbia is funded like a ponzi scheme
How Suburban Sprawl Is A Ponzi Scheme | Smart Cities Dive
www.smartcitiesdive.comzip
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Sarah Brown
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Potholes and surface repair on motorways.
Portugal: If there's a problem, someone comes out overnight, cones off a section of road, and fixes it.
UK: 50mph speed limit for 18 months whilst government spaffs money to private contractors who don't actually fix the damned thing for 18 months, but their CEO went to Oriel with the transport minister, or some shit.
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Cries in Merkels 16-year austerity reign over Germany
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