Do you mean property tax because the income tax is a state tax? I don't think it's true any more but for a long while Johnson county had the 1% local option tax and Marion county didn't (at least not the full 1%).
Anybody know who's behind the no-annexation bill?
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The problem with this, though, is that people (and businesses, of course) often leave cities in order to avoid escalating taxation. Around here, they've been expanding outside the county to avoid even the possibility of annexation. That peeves city leaders, of course. But, rather than pout about it, shouldn't they treat the disease rather than the symptoms?
This is no different than the feds seeking to punish multinational companies that engage in inversion. They're doing it because our tax code is increasingly uncompetitive. Rather than trying to block the inversion or institute some form of retribution, address the tax code to make it competitive...you dummies.
Bloomington and Evansville, etc. should be working to attract people and businesses, not using annexation to gobble up those who have left them.
I strenuously disagree regarding the local portion of your post (agree with the federal). It costs money and resources to properly run a city....most specifically with infrastructure and public safety. Free loaders want the economic benefits of living near the city, but not pay anything for its needs to properly function. That's why I support regional taxing, not city/county.
It is tough. People want to live next to a city that provides parks, concerts, sports teams, whatever else, but they don't want to pay for them. It is the free-rider problem. I know when I go to a local park and watch a summer concert, there are plenty of other county people there. There is a reason they live 1 mile from city limits and not 20.
Regional taxing may work, but who determines what a region is?
Taxing entities exist in a competitive landscape no different than anybody else who competes for resources. Of course it costs money to have a civilized society -- nobody is suggesting otherwise. I'm not saying the cities should just end taxation, twenty. But they also have to be mindful that people (and businesses) have choices....and they can just as easily choose somebody and somewhere else. And, if you change the taxation borders to try to address this problem, you'll simply chase people and businesses farther out.
There's absolutely no way to win the game they're trying to play. If there was, Detroit wouldn't have become what Detroit has become. And I don't think the answer was to change the taxation boundaries.
If you want to be a successful city/county/state/country, have a mix of policies that attract people and businesses, not ones which repel them.
Clearly there is already plenty of economic appeal to cities.....look at where all the population growth is concentrated around the state (and nation). It's all around cities as that's where the economic opportunities are (as well as the cultural aspects many people desire.)
But you have basically a lot of free loaders in suburban counties under the current taxing structure. Everything is based upon the micro-locale where the individual lives. It's a very inconsistent and frankly incoherent way to tax population regions. I agree that annexation by increment (such as Bloomington) isn't the ideal
But if you really don't want any part of it....there are plenty of rural counties far, far away from cities that'll never be annexed by anyone ever. Go there.
Oh, I understand entirely what you're saying. But what you're advocating to address it is politically fanciful, at best. As such, cities need to act accordingly rather than hoping that somebody will swoop in and save the day by somehow capturing taxes from these suburban people and entities who have fled.
If people are "freeloading" cultural/sporting events, then charge fees for whatever it is they're getting but aren't paying for through traditional forms of taxation. Tack on a fee for those who don't live in the city/county limits or something. That doesn't seem like too difficult a problem to address, if that's really it. Do the same with road/bridge tolls.
But trying to do what you're advocating they do -- let alone what they're trying to do now -- isn't going to work. Everybody has to make a good value proposition -- governments aren't excluded from that.
How do you charge for parks? I guess you could put a fence with a gate and hire someone to sit at the gate, but that all raises the cost even more. And it starts to become inconvenient for the people who live near the park but now have to go to the other side to enter.
Part of the problem is psychological. For some of us, paying our "fair share" has become "pay nothing and let some other sucker finance it".
Couldn't you say the same thing about some low-income individual who likes parks, public schools, and other public services and amenities, but pays little in taxes while expecting companies and wealthy individuals to cover the bills? I mean, I realize you can't squeeze blood from a turnip. But you also shouldn't be too surprised when those who have blood to squeeze do everything they can to avoid it being squeezed. They like having their blood too, you know.
Let me ask this, what if Bloomington had succeeded in annexing Cook's property and then Cook had decided to start diverting more and more of their administrative and executive jobs to some other locale entirely? Where would that leave Bloomington?
Again, the bottom line here is that all jurisdictions -- states, municipalities, countries -- have to be very mindful of the value proposition. People have choices. Companies have choices. And it should come as absolutely no surprise to anybody that people want as much as they can get for as little as they have to spend to get it. That's true of rich people, poor people, and everybody in between. Rather than piss and moan about that truism, adapt to it. Those who do will prosper, those who don't won't.
Why do you think East Germany built the Berlin Wall? Keep in mind that they built it some 15 years after Berlin was subdivided. In that period of time, some 1.5 - 2 million residents of East Germany had fled to the West. Why? Well, because the West offered a better deal. So what was East Germany's response? "Oh no you don't. We'll do what we have to in order to keep you and your labor here."
Rather than take draconian steps to keep their citizens from leaving, what they should've done is (a) understand why it was their citizens were wanting to leave, and (b) taken steps to address those underlying concerns.
The irony is that those most inclined to be up in arms about this are the first to condemn other recipients of tax supported benefits.
Heh, well, that's probably because the people you're talking about tend to pay more into tax coffers than the "other recipients of tax supported benefits".
If Wal-Mart decided to price a gallon of milk according to one's income, I'm sure they would quickly see a sharp decrease in the sales of milk to those whose incomes dictate that they spend more than the market price for a gallon of milk, and a sharp increase in the sales of milk to those whose incomes dictate that they spend less than the market price.
If they did such a thing for all their wares, they'd be out of business within a week. And that's because everybody likes a bargain that is better for them and worse for others....that's true of rich people, poor people, and everybody in between. But economic reality just doesn't really support that fantasy very reliably.
LOL....annexation in Bloomington is now comparble to the Berlin wall? Come on, man.
I have no idea the details of what's going on down there, haven't lived there for 13 years. But hard to believe whatever was being proposed would have such an impact that Cook is going to uproot and go....where?
No, actually, it makes for a valuable lesson -- to those open to seeing it, anyway.
My point in referencing the Berlin Wall is not to compare Bloomington to East Germany or conjure up images of guard towers with searchlights and automatic weapons. Rather, it's to get people to understand that everybody has choices and they are always going to make efforts to make those choices which, everything considered, are in their own best interest.
The analogy is that it's typical for countries (or cities, or whatever) to first react in such a way as to put handcuffs on people -- in a figurative sense, if not a literal one. This is the wrong answer. What they should be doing is taking steps so that people choose them and what they have to offer willingly.
Look at the state of Illinois for a great example of this. Should Illinois also seek some kind of "regional tax" to remedy their own massive shortfalls? Should Indiana, Iowa, and Wisconsin be taxed to cover Illinois' shortfalls simply because Chicago -- the regional metropolis -- offers such great cultural and economic opportunities?
That's not the way to succeed in this game, people.
I don't know about Cook, I suspect they were involved because grass roots movements don't have enough firepower to get the statehouse involved in days. I do know a lot of individuals (ie, neighbors) who were livid at being annexed. The point becomes, if Cook's bottom line negotiating point is "not one more cent for taxes", what could the city possibly do? I have no idea what Cook was willing to do, nor what the city was willing to do.
I know Cook was involved personally in the area. Like Sope, I am from Columbus originally and I know that Miller was hugely involved in Columbus. Miller, late in his life, rebought a lot of shares of Cummins when it looked like it might be sold and moved. I am wondering if that sort of thinking is gone with that generation, and is that for the better?
You're missing the point, twenty.
The answer to this problem is not to use one form of coercion or another against those who are escaping the burdens. The answer is to offer a value proposition that doesn't compel taxpayers to leave.
Of course the Berlin Wall offers a useful historical comparison. People didn't like what East Germany had to offer...so they made a rational choice to go elsewhere. And the East German response wasn't to improve what they were offering but, rather, to take steps to forcibly keep people from being able to leave.
"Market price" . . . I can understand that concept with a low-price elasticity commodity like a gallon of milk, but even in that context there isn't a single "market" even in the same town. Folks in more affluent areas of town often do pay more, for the convenience of a stellar store located closer to their homes.
Aside from that, we've discussed here how markets are skewed to the point of often not being effective . . . such as in the health care/health insurance "markets". So I hear you, but it's pretty faint.
Well, Bill Cook hasn't been dead for all that long. I imagine he was very much alive when they opted to locate outside the city limits.
Being devoted to one's community doesn't have to mean, and shouldn't mean, being willing to grab your ankles to whatever degree your community demands you do.
Our area, like many areas, is currently experiencing a healthcare boom. About a decade ago, one of our two major healthcare orgs (Deaconess) bought a large parcel of land right at the Vanderburgh/Warrick county (on the Warrick side, which is to say the suburban) border. Not long after, their major competitor (St. Mary's, now part of St. Vincent's) bought a similarly large parcel of land across the street. It has now bloomed into a huge (and growing) healthcare corridor. And it is quite safely nestled outside not only city limits, but county limits. That is not a cosmic accident, I can assure you.
Now, maybe there was nothing city and county officials could have done to keep that development here. But, the point is, those entities saw a better opportunity in another county. And that's something that should give our policymakers here some pause. Why does somebody see a more fruitful opportunity somewhere else? And what can we do to remedy that?
That's a ridiculous comparison. People left because everything offered in the West was superior. And they didn't return on a daily basis....they fled for good.
How would the annexed areas feel if Bloomington built a wall around it and forbid anyone from outside to enter without paying a $5 fee every day?
What exactly are the great tax differences in these areas, anyway? Since the institute of property tax caps statewide, is there really that great of a difference from a business perspective where you are located?
Well, yeah. Of course people will pay for convenience. They'll also pay for such things as quality, brand status, etc. There are all kinds of things that play into value. That has absolutely nothing to do with what I'm saying.
What I'm saying is that nobody would willingly pay more for Object A -- whatever Object A is -- simply because they have a higher income than somebody else. If you don't like my example of milk, make it something else. How about a car. If you went to a dealer and expressed interest in an automobile -- any kind, take your pick -- and they told you that the pricing was determined by your income and that this meant that you (as somebody who earns well above the median or mean) had to pay a higher price for the car than somebody else who made below-average income, would you willingly do this? Of course not. But I bet the lower-income folks would be quite content with that arrangement.
And this is the problem with public services. Most of them are priced according to one's income. So it should come as no surprise to anybody that they're attractive to those who don't have to pay much in that arrangement and unattractive to those who have to pay a lot for what is ultimately little in the way of return.
I suppose you can try to appeal to their civic nature or guilt-trip them about "fair share" and all that. But, again, it's ultimately pissing into the wind. People are always going to tend towards doing whatever they see as being in their best interest. And that goes for people of all incomes, of all races, of all religions, creeds, etc. Human nature is what it is.
I am pretty sure Cook is on city water and sewer, just apply a $1 trillion surcharge to water and sewer but give city residents a $1 trillion waiver. OK, a trillion may be a bit much, but some smart person could figure out what Cook would have paid. So there are ways of circumventing this. Not that I think the city should, the city should admit defeat for now.
But there is a race to the bottom we cannot win. Big corporations demand massive infrastructure to support them moving to an area, tax credits to move to an area, and who knows what else. They arrive, pay no taxes while using up their credits to move there, then move out if anyone suggests their credits have expired and they now should pay. So the result is simple, we citizens pay to provide welfare to corporations. And the very people who curse welfare for citizens seem to love it for corporations (all this applies to sports teams as well).
Well, I'm not comparing Bloomington to East Berlin, though. I'm using that example to illustrate a very specific point. And that point is this: people have choices....and it's hardly unprecedented for societies to seek to limit choices (or, at least, the outcomes of those choices) rather than to try to improve whatever it is they have to offer whenever people start choosing something or someplace else. The better answer is to address whatever it is that is making people want to go elsewhere, isn't it?
If you object to that example, then just consider my question about Illinois. I mean, they could argue that everything Chicago has to offer benefits people who aren't in Illinois. But they're out of their minds if they think that means surrounding taxpayers are going to be willing to bail that state out of their fiscal mess. Moreover, I can't imagine how tough it must be right now to attract outside investment. One of the things any such investor would effectively be buying is an ongoing share of the state's massive shortfall.
Whoa. I can't speak for anybody else, but I detest corporate welfare. And I'm most certainly not sitting here shilling for it. So don't be presumptuous, Marvin. I'm not a fan of redistribution of wealth in any form -- regardless who it's being redistributing from or to. I certainly realize that some level redistribution is necessary for a civilized society. But it's a necessary evil. And I don't like it anymore when it's redistributed to a corporate entity or a rich guy as when it's redistributed away from a corporate entity or rich guy.
No, what I'm saying here is not that Joe Sixpack should pick up the tax bill for companies like Cook, but that taxing jurisdictions should formulate policies that are mindful that everybody has choices they can make and that they are all going to (tend to, anyway) make choices that are in their best interest.
If you're formulating policy based on a "fair share" argument, you're going to lose the game. And that doesn't make a lick of sense.
Of course people have choices.....and these people/companies have decided that living right in the Bloomington region is beneficial to them. They are free to move to many other areas. Probably could move to Green county and not worry about any tax hikes.
But I don't feel for people that live right on the border of a city, and are then appalled at the thought they would have to pay the same as someone across the street. The one lady was quoted in the paper as being upset they would have to follow city rules on bonfires, etc.....
Tough crap. There are endless acres of rural living available to anyone that wants that, in Indiana. For very cheap. But will these people do that? Of course not.
How do cities win this game? We know right now that the retail sector is dying. Those HH Gregg and Family Christian and Sears and KMart and whatever else stores are never going to fill back in completely. So cities are going to be losing millions. If our manufacturing sector takes the position of not one more dime for taxes, what are we left with?
We know Trump negotiated with Carrier so Carrier would keep some, not all, the jobs in Indiana. Did you support that? Is that corporate welfare?
Well, this isn't about "feeling" for anybody. This isn't about who merits sympathy and who doesn't. It's about operating with a keen eye on the fact that people have choices. And I don't think Bloomington would feel any less chapped about losing, say, Cook's tax revenues if the company had decided to locate outside Monroe County. The impact on their tax coffers wouldn't be any different, would it?
FTR, I'm not at all advocating any freeloading. I'm a staunch believer in people (and companies) paying the freight for the goods and services they consume. But government entities -- like companies and individuals -- need to understand the value of the benefits they offer and the prices at which they offer them. If they lose sight of this, they'll be fighting -- and losing -- many more of these battles in the future.
That's a good question. I can't say I know what the answer is. But I do know what the answer isn't.
Again, if the problem is municipal infrastructure and services and such, then charge fees. I've long been a big fan of tolls as the single best way to pay for roads, bridges, and highways. You charge the people who use them, not the people who don't. Now, if there's no plausible way to recoup the investment for something, then reconsider the investment. I about hit the floor a couple years ago when I heard that Detroit, in all of its economic and social morass, was going to finance a new hockey stadium for the Red Wings. Talk about pouring fuel on the fire.
Yes it's corporate welfare. And no I didn't support it. I didn't support bailing GM and Chrysler out, either. But a lot of people who frequently wail about corporate welfare did. Did you? I also didn't support bailing out banks, airlines, etc. If Jeb Bush ever said anything that really warranted sober contemplation, it's that the freedom to fail is part and parcel to the freedom to succeed. You really can't have one without the other.
If our mix of labor supply and costs, education, infrastructure, productivity, etc. did not make us attractive to Carrier, then I'd say we're ultimately better off letting them go and instead focusing on allocating our resources towards something more promising and gainful. Thing is: we've convinced ourselves that there's nothing more promising and gainful coming down the pike, so we're instead lurching desperately to cling to what we have....irrespective of the underlying economic reality.
By the way, I wouldn't say the retail sector is "dying". Rather, it's undergoing a high degree of flux. People are still buying retail products. But how they buy them, and who they buy them from, is changing in a big way. It tempting to say that it's been a quick change, but it really hasn't been all that quick. Retail has been headed in this direction for quite some time.
From the perspective of the folks at Eastman Kodak, the photography industry was dying a couple decades ago. But it wasn't, of course. People are taking more photographs today than they ever have. The changes have certainly resulted in a change of where the dollars which support this go -- and it likely changed the amount of money people needed to spend to capture photographic memories. As such, Eastman Kodak was ill-prepared for this change and went from being a Dow 30 company to bankruptcy pretty quickly.
So, I think you could argue that the retail sector as we've known it is dying. But the retail sector overall is simply going through significant change -- and some are adapting to those changes well, others aren't.
The problem is the changes to retail are going to hurt. Amazon will have employees in specific locations, but we will lose jobs at other locations as retailers go out. We then lose the tax base their buildings bring in. We might lose entire shopping centers/malls. We lose the people who sell/service HVAC and other items to those retail locations no longer needing HVAC/plumbing/etc. The new world will change a lot at the local level. Some places, those with Amazon distribution centers, will win. But a lot of places are losng.
Eventually this may work out. If i had money (or a unicorn, both are as likely), I have been considering how to build an entertainment facility. People can't just go to Amazon for entertainment. Maybe more dinner theater, more improv comedy dinner, maybe something like medieval times. I don't have the perfect answer, but I think rent is about to become very cheap and some sort of entertainment spot is much more likely to catch on than retail.
So, you're saying that Joseph Schumpeter was right, eh? Yeah, I'd say he was too.
Of course change hurts -- because there are always people who are heavily invested in whatever's being replaced. But you always have to consider the other side of the ledger, too. And, in this case, I don't mean Amazon, but consumers. Thirty years ago, the culprit upending the old retail sector was Wal-Mart. Well, why did Wal-Mart succeed? Because they brought benefit to millions and millions of people. Did that come at a cost to others? You bet it did. Was it a good thing or a bad thing for communities? That depends who you ask. I think there are arguments to be made on both sides of the question. But, at the end of the day, it's the consumers themselves who decide these things (and should).
And, now, it's Wal-Mart on the defensive. Isn't that interesting?
So what does this portend for the future? Abandoned dilapidated eyesores that we used to call "Big Box Retailers" littering the landscape? Probably. And, no, that's not a good thing. But it also likely means that dollars go further than they used to. And those kinds of things are hard to photograph for a magazine or a documentary film. We tend not to consider them -- and that's because we like and expect benefits, but hate the tradeoffs that often come with them.
It's odd. But right at the same time where brick/mortar retailers are dying in great numbers, congestion at my local shopping district has never, EVER been worse. I go way out of my way to avoid driving around the area where Wally World, Target, Home Depot, Sam's, Best Buy, Lowe's, and (soon) Costco are located. So...perhaps a benefit of this change will be a reduction in traffic congestion?
It's hard to predict. But one thing I will predict is that people and societies who adapt to change will ultimately be better off than those who try to resist it.
Change is inevitable. The fight is toward what kind of change. I think there can be public pressure of corporations to be good neighbors. We have seen corporations run afoul of social media already and lose. Even a relatively big company like Subway gave into some food blogger, who frankly, had no idea what she was talking about. The future may well include shaming of corporations that don't behave as good neighbors. I am not sure this Cook item qualifies as that, but I do think someday a Carrier or someone is going to try and move and there will be someone there with savvy social media skills who will create the social media campaign that makes buying their product as toxic as flying United. It's going to happen, I just wish I had those savvy skills. But let's face it, where I come from we just use the Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator and the problem is solved.
So they did pass Johnson huh? It used to be that Marion county was less than Johnson.
Same way the state does.... charge an entrance fee. Let people who live in the county get in free and those from another county pay.
How do you do that on parks and trails? I see two options, one is a nametag given to people who live in the community they must wear in the park. Two is to fence in the park with a gate that has an employee checking ID's. Neither option sounds good to me. This isn't like Brown County State Park where there are a limited number of ways in (for most people, I am sure some people park in Nashville and hike in but that has to be a fairly small number). How could Indy setup the Monon so one has to be a Marion County resident to walk/ride/skate it or pay?
He can't defend the indefensible other than to say the Kommies in Bloomington got their comeuppance.
Let's stop beating around the bush here.
The elephant in the room, so to speak, isn't people who reside near -- but not in -- town coming to have a picnic in a city park they don't pay taxes for. Rather, it's that a significant share of the people (not to mention companies) who have relocated outside city limits tend towards the hefty side of the taxpayer scale. Fees to use public parks (while I have no qualms against pay-per-use fees for parks, roads, or otherwise) aren't going to replace the tax dollars they took with them.
But that's where the conversation ultimately ends up when people throw out the "freeloading public services" chestnut. That invites others to respond: hey, if you don't want people freeloading public services, then just charge fees to anybody from out of town who wants to use them. I'd like to think that everybody here is smart enough to realize that the former is a bluff, and the latter is the bluff being called.
I appreciate the quandary this puts cities and towns in. But they're looking in the wrong place to fix it.
Which is ultimately why we have annexation, and ultimately why you need to listen to Marvin's (or twenty's?) advice: if you don't want to live in the city, move into one of the rural counties that will never be annexed by anyone.
Ah, but see, that would be another bluff, wouldn't it? Because you want to be near the city. In other words, we can easily turn this conversation backwards: I understand the quandary landowners are in, but hamstringing the ability of cities to annex suburbs is the wrong way to fix it.
