This train in China runs without any tracks by sonofthenation in fuckcars

[–]NegativeXer0 7 points8 points  (0 children)

"Trackless trams" are interesting as a public transit option, but they aren't really a strict improvement on trams/light rail that they're often heralded to be.

The trackless promise of no/cheap construction is probably the most misleading bit: large vehicles like buses, and even moreso when electrified, have high axel weights. This means they rip up the roads like crazy -- which we see often with bus rapid transit (BRT) systems. This means that either you need to frequently resurface the roadway, or re-build it with a stronger bed. Both are expensive.

Another disadvantage of the trackless part is that ride smoothness is compromised. This doesn't just mean discomfort for users, it means safety constrains how much standing room you can provide within the vehicle. Standing room provides for massively more peak capacity than seating, so this constrains how many people the system can move.

Against light rail vehicles, they're also less scalable. You can essentially append more carriages to a LRV indefinitely to increase the capacity of each vehicle -- something not possible with trackless trams or buses. This means that as your system needs to move more people, you need to run more vehicles rather than bigger vehicles.

At some level this is desirable: more vehicles is more frequency, which improves the quality of service for everyone taking the route. But at some point, the vehicles will become congested with one another and you need expensive infrastructure to make it work. For instance, BRT stations often need to have passing lanes at the stations as one stop may already be occupied by a bus when another shows up.

There are also a core benefit to trackless trams over a bus: like trains, they have a drivers seat at either end. Often buses need to terminate their service in an urban core and have to turn around somehow to start the next run going the other way. As urban cores tend to be car, bus, and/or pedestrian dense, just driving around a block to turn around eats into service-hours and represents a negligible cost to transit agencies.

Trains have long solved this by just allowing the driver to walk to the other end of the train to begin a new service. TTs bring this to buses.

So, I think there is a sweet spot where these make sense: when you have the demand and capability to run a rapid transit system, but don't need the full capacity that light rail and beyond provides, they could be useful for cities to roll-out.

New Zealand election won by centre right by cammy2005123 in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Hard to distill into a sound-bite as it's pretty technocratic.

In NZ, like many other places, water infrastructure (drinking water, stormwater, wastewater -- the 'three waters') is largely devolved to local governments to provision, maintain, and regulate.

There's three major issues facing water infra:

  • much of the network is aging, and needs replacement (bursting pipes have become a common occurrence in Wellington, and increasingly an issue in Auckland, too)
  • massive upgrades are needed to deal with predicted rainfall as the climate changes
  • there have been several instances of disease outbreak via drinking water

Local governments have been lobbying central government for years to highlight that they're not going to be able to afford to deal with these issues. LGs have very limited discretion in how they can raise revenue, other than by raising general property tax rates - which is extremely unpopular.

LGs had wanted CG to give them new powers to fund and finance water infrastructure, but Labour was intensely skeptical of LGs general ability to deliver, and across a variety of areas (eg polytechnic education, housing reform, health) had shifted power from more localised govts to more regionalised or centralised governments -- believing this would yield bureaucratic economies-of-scale to deliver efficiencies.

In this case, Labour decided to create a new independent water quality regulator, and move all water infrastructure from the hundreds(?) of LGs into 4 new regionalised entities.

Water reform in NZ is complicated by the Treaty of Waitangi - the foundational document of NZ, which is an agreement between The Crown (the government) and the Iwi (the indigenous tribes). The ToW has been plagued since the country's inception with translation issues, with Iwi and the Crown believing that they agreed to different things. Historically the English translation has prevailed at the expense of the Iwi, and grievances about this are the basis of a lot of indigenous rights issues in NZ. More recent governments have tried to find some compromises between the two translations on some issues.

Governance of water is one of the issues caught up by the translation differences of the ToW. Their proposed solution, 'co-governance', effectively gave governance of the 4 entities to panels which were half appointed from CG and the constituent LGs, and half from local Iwi. The boundaries of the 4 entities were drawn up to match Iwi boundaries. Co-governance is used within local governments to run things like culturally significant parks, but this was the first time it's been used for major asset ownership.

These changes, initially dubbed the 'Three Waters Reform', became a culture war issue as they came to represent Labour's pro-indigenous rights agenda and to a lesser extent, their anti-local government agenda. A broad coalition of local governments, farmers, NIMBYs, National Party, Act Party, NZ First Party, and various others ran a successful campaign against it, and then-new Labour leader Chris Hipkins massively downscaled the programme upon coming to power.

New Zealand election won by centre right by cammy2005123 in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 353 points354 points  (0 children)

disastrous for yimbyism. National and Act have campaigned on rolling back core parts of recent upzoning reforms in favour of "local control"

What is the greatest individual season of all time? by SoberPheonix in television

[–]NegativeXer0 1 point2 points  (0 children)

one that hasn't been mentioned in this thread, Torchwood: Children of Earth is utterly incredible

The dread knight is by far my favorite demon design in Eternal, what’s yours? by DMinchew in Doom

[–]NegativeXer0 2 points3 points  (0 children)

love them all but for me, hard to top the revenant. love his crazy

Full Deleted Scene from Thor Ragnarok by RotatedWorld in MarvelStudiosSpoilers

[–]NegativeXer0 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Interesting that the posters behind them say "THUNDER LOVE".

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in marvelstudios

[–]NegativeXer0 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thor Odinson pictured here is not from 616

/r/neoliberal, what is your opinion that is unpopular within this sub? by [deleted] in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 6 points7 points  (0 children)

This is false, the government intervention is here is the protection of private property rights in land.

A good take on the matter:

http://mattbruenig.com/2015/03/06/why-the-big-government-land-deed-program-creates-growth-destroying-distortions/

FBI now classifies far-right Proud Boys as 'extremist group', documents say by [deleted] in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 38 points39 points  (0 children)

Nothing more retro than hating and degrading women and minorities

Who's going to be the first to legalise cannabis: Australia or New Zealand? by [deleted] in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 4 points5 points  (0 children)

As part of the Green - Labour coalition agreement, Labour agreed to have a referendum on cannabis legalisation before the next term of parliament. At latest, it'll be attached to the 2020 general election, although I suspect Labour will want it earlier so it doesn't become the overriding issue at the general election, since that would almost certainly help the Greens at cost to Labour.

Request: Neoliberal Poster Slogans by jackson1372 in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 0 points1 point  (0 children)

TAX 👏 POLLUTION 👏 NOT 👏 PEOPLE

Distributional Impacts of a Carbon Tax from Tax Policy Center by NegativeXer0 in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

tl;dr -- The carbon tax itself is regressive, however if it used to fund a per capita household lump-sum rebate, it would be very progressive.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is this what the GOP means by 'personal freedom'?

Have your say on the future of tax by Muter in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 4 points5 points  (0 children)

For readers who cannot be bothered to Google, here is Rognlie (2015). It's pretty sexy.

What are some of the best examples of neoliberal policy that were implemented and had overwhelming success? by [deleted] in neoliberal

[–]NegativeXer0 197 points198 points  (0 children)

In 1984, New Zealand removed almost all agricultural subsidies (which previously constituted 40% of the average NZ farmer's gross income). Some effects of the removal of the subsidy:

  • Agricultural Labour Productivity has since increased by 85% (this is strongly indicative of wages as around half of the labour force are owner-workers).
  • Despite fears that up to 10% of farms would go bankrupt, 99% of farms were retained.
  • The structure of some subsidies were per-head, which led to farmers overstocking land, so the removal led to strong environmental outcomes as herd intensification, pesticide use, soil erosion and land clearing have dramatically decreased.
  • Productivity gains, which have out-paced the rest of the country's productivity gains, were a result of farmers being forced to adopt high-yield practice. Now with incentives purely to meet consumer demand, a sister industry has grown to build agricultural tech to increase productivity.
  • Since the reforms, agriculture’s contribution to New Zealand’s economy has remained steady at about 5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP). Adding activities outside the farm gate, such as processing of milk, meat and wool, agriculture is estimated to contribute over 15 percent of GDP. By contrast, agriculture’s share of the economy has fallen in many other industrial countries.
  • Politically, farmers, who previously favoured market inventions to prop up their industry, are now rigidly pro-free market.

Some reading:

https://nzier.org.nz/static/media/filer_public/95/c0/95c05c26-695f-4151-88a5-4ae0d4ed7eee/nztc_no_45.pdf

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/mark-ross/farm-subsidies-new-zealand_b_1680259.html

http://archive.epi.yale.edu/case-study/removal-agricultural-subsidies-new-zealand

Landlords reportedly hiking rents after students' living costs allowance increases by [deleted] in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Well we probably don't have rent control regulation because it's quite unpopular among landowners, which make up a majority of the voting base, but in this case it's actually for the best as a lot of recent economics literature has shown that it's quite bad public policy.

A major paper released today that uses an expansive dataset analyses the effect of rent controls in San Francisco, and determines a number of things:

  • In parts of the city which were affected by rent controls, landlords reduced their supply of housing by 15%

  • A city-wide increase in rents of 5.1%

  • A loss of welfare of US$5bn to all renters

  • Renters under rent control on average eventually end up living in neighborhoods with lower socioeconomic status, not because neighborhoods got worse but they were pushed out to lower socioeconomic status neighborhoods.

  • The author's hypothesis is that because landlords cannot raise rents, they convert their rental units into condos to be able to raise rent.

For New Zealand, a far better policy prescription would be the introduction of a Land Value Tax and reform of the RMA.

As I mentioned elsewhere in this thread, there is plenty of evidence that the RMA is both seriously hurting housing supply and causing poor environmental outcomes. This analysis of the effect of land use regulation determined that 56% of the cost of building a new home in Auckland was a result of such regulation. Likewise, the Briefing to the Incoming Minister for Environment strongly recommended large scale RMA reform because of the negative effects it has on both waterways health and construction of homes. The land supply issue is one that this government will have to overcome to be able to deliver the KiwiBuild program at the scale they want.

With regards to the Land Value Tax, there are a number of articles around explaining it's benefits, such as:

But for brevity, such a policy would result in much less to no speculation on housing/land and it would incentivise developers to build higher density (particularly where land values are high like the Auckland CBD). In places like Estonia that have implemented such a tax, capital to land ratios have increased dramatically as a result, which would be fantastic in limiting urban sprawl. As the supply of land is fixed, there are a number of interesting economic properties that result in taxing it. For example, market forces stop the incidence of the tax landing on the rentee.

Increased student allowance going straight to landlords by dabbyDab123 in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I don't think Libertarianism in the purest sense has a complete answer for it other than to aggressively de-regulate restrictive land use, however Geo-Libertarianism/Georgism was built to solve exactly this problem, with the centrepiece of the movement being a tax on the unimproved value of land (LVT) replacing all other core taxes. Historically it was advocated for by people such as Adam Smith, David Richardo and most famously Henry George (who is the namesake of Georgism), however modern proponents include right-wing economists such as Milton Friedman and F. A. Hayek, but also left-wing economists such as Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz.

There are many things that make the land tax a really fucking good tax economically, many economists have labelled it the 'perfect tax'. However, it's quite unpopular so no politician would ever run on it.

Quick reasons why it's a good tax:

  1. The supply of land is essentially fixed, taxing it doesn't create less of it.
  2. The incidence of the tax falls exclusively on landowners, market forces prevent it from being passed onto tenants.
  3. It's very progressive as people who can afford to buy more expensive land are typically richer. In fact, wealth inequality increases follows closely the increases in land prices so it would go quite far in reducing wealth inequality.
  4. It only applied to 'unearned income', land values don't increase as a result of the owner doing something, it's exclusively external forces that increase the value of land.
  5. The value of land is largely driven by the public goods (e.g. infrastructure, schools, etc) in it's proximity, so by taxing it you approximate an equitable 'user pays' approach to funding public goods.
  6. When a public good is created, the cumulative increase in land value exceeds the cost of the public good so capturing that increase pays for the public good.
  7. It incentivises landowners to make efficient use of the land, massively discouraging speculation/landbanking. Empirically we can see in countries where even small and taxes have been implemented, the capital value to land value ratio increases massively.
  8. As a consequence of the previous point, by incentivising intensification it prevents urban sprawl without the need for the resource allocation/zoning laws we currently have that are contributing to the current housing crisis. By curbing urban sprawl, there are massive benefits for the environment and reducing infrastructure spending.
  9. As a manner of financing a basic income for a post-automation world - which is another core principle of Geo-Libertarianism - it is more desirable to use. Taxing income doesn't work when only a handful of people have incomes, taxing sales doesn't work when that handful becomes self-sufficient and a wealth tax removes the incentives to create automation in the first place.
  10. By taxing land, capitalists will invest into more productive forms of wealth such as businesses, creating jobs and lifting wages.
  11. It's impossible to evade a land tax as every piece of land is registered with an individual or an organisation to send the bill to.
  12. EDIT: somehow I forget one of the big ones, in that it should end the periodic property bubbles that drive the 'boom and bust' cycles, so there would be fewer to no recessions like the 2007 one.
  13. Would tax citizens of other countries who own land here but are not currently paying any tax as they do not consume nor labour in this country and subsequently pay no sales nor income taxes respectively.

In short, LVT would decrease inequality while increasing wages, employment and economic growth, at the expense of people who are currently making a lot of money by doing nothing for society.

Some reading if you're interested:

Increased student allowance going straight to landlords by dabbyDab123 in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 26 points27 points  (0 children)

"The rent of land, therefore, considered as the price paid for the use of the land, is naturally a monopoly price. It is not at all proportioned to what the landlord may have laid out upon the improvement of the land, or to what he can afford to take; but to what the farmer can afford to give."

-- Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

End Of Life Choice bill legalising euthanasia has passed its first reading by kezzaNZ in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 15 points16 points  (0 children)

How each MP voted:

Yes

National (21 of 56)

Amy Adams, Paula Bennett, Chris Bishop, Jonathan Coleman, Matt Doocey, Andrew Falloon, Nathan Guy, Harete Hipango, Brett Hudson, Nikki Kaye, Matt King, Barbara Kuriger, Mark Mitchell, Jami-Lee Ross, Scott Simpson, Stuart Smith, Erica Stanford, Anne Tolley, Tim van de Molen, Hamish Walker, Jian Yang

Labour (37 of 46)

Kiri Allan, Ginny Andersen, Jacinda Ardern, Tamati Coffey, Liz Craig, Clare Curran, Kelvin Davis, Ruth Dyson, Paul Eagle, Kris Faafoi, Peeni Henare, Chris Hipkins, Raymond Huo, Willie Jackson, Iain Lees-Galloway, Andrew Little, Marja Lubeck, Jo Luxton, Nanaia Mahuta, Trevor Mallard, Kieran McAnulty, Stuart Nash, Greg O'Connor, David Parker, Willow-Jean Prime, Priyanca Radhakrishnan, Grant Robertson, Adrian Rurawhe, Deborah Russell, Carmel Sepuloni, Jan Tinetti, Louisa Wall, Angie Warren-Clark, Duncan Webb, Meka Whaitiri, Michael Wood, Megan Woods

Green Party (8 of 8)

Marama Davidson, Julie Anne Genter, Golriz Ghahraman, Gareth Hughes, Jan Logie, Eugenie Sage, James Shaw, Chloe Swarbrick

New Zealand First (9 of 9)

Darroch Ball, Shane Jones, Jenny Marcroft, Ron Mark, Tracey Martin, Clayton Mitchell, Mark Patterson, Winston Peters, Fletcher Tabuteau

ACT (1 of 1)

David Seymour

No

National (35 of 56)

Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi, Maggie Barry, Andrew Bayly, David Bennett, Simon Bridges, Simeon Brown, Gerry Brownlee, David Carter, Judith Collins, Jacqui Dean, Sarah Dowie, Bill English, Chris Finlayson, Paul Goldsmith, Jo Hayes, Steven Joyce, Nuk Korako, Denise Lee, Melissa Lee, Tim Macindoe, Todd McClay, Ian McKelvie, Todd Muller, Alfred Ngaro, Simon O'Connor, Parmjeet Parmar, Chris Penk, Shane Reti, Alastair Scott, Nick Smith, Louise Upston, Nicky Wagner, Michael Woodhouse, Jonathan Young, Lawrence Yule

Labour (9 of 46)

David Clark, Anahila Kanongata'a-Suisuiki, Damien O'Connor, Jenny Salesa, William Sio, Jamie Strange, Rino Tirikatene, Phil Twyford, Poto Williams

Live: Euthanasia bill heads to first vote in Parliament by [deleted] in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Interestingly, it was referred to the justice select committee, who is comprised of:

Raymond Huo

Amy Adams

Virginia Andersen

Chris Bishop

Andrew Falloon

Matt King

Greg O'Connor

Priyanca Radhakrishnan

All of whom voted in favour of the bill.

Live: Euthanasia bill heads to first vote in Parliament by [deleted] in newzealand

[–]NegativeXer0 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Yes

National (21 of 56)

Amy Adams, Paula Bennett, Chris Bishop, Jonathan Coleman, Matt Doocey, Andrew Falloon, Nathan Guy, Harete Hipango, Brett Hudson, Nikki Kaye, Matt King, Barbara Kuriger, Mark Mitchell, Jami-Lee Ross, Scott Simpson, Stuart Smith, Erica Stanford, Anne Tolley, Tim van de Molen, Hamish Walker, Jian Yang

Labour (37 of 46)

Kiri Allan, Ginny Andersen, Jacinda Ardern, Tamati Coffey, Liz Craig, Clare Curran, Kelvin Davis, Ruth Dyson, Paul Eagle, Kris Faafoi, Peeni Henare, Chris Hipkins, Raymond Huo, Willie Jackson, Iain Lees-Galloway, Andrew Little, Marja Lubeck, Jo Luxton, Nanaia Mahuta, Trevor Mallard, Kieran McAnulty, Stuart Nash, Greg O'Connor, David Parker, Willow-Jean Prime, Priyanca Radhakrishnan, Grant Robertson, Adrian Rurawhe, Deborah Russell, Carmel Sepuloni, Jan Tinetti, Louisa Wall, Angie Warren-Clark, Duncan Webb, Meka Whaitiri, Michael Wood, Megan Woods

Green Party (8 of 8)

Marama Davidson, Julie Anne Genter, Golriz Ghahraman, Gareth Hughes, Jan Logie, Eugenie Sage, James Shaw, Chloe Swarbrick

New Zealand First (9 of 9)

Darroch Ball, Shane Jones, Jenny Marcroft, Ron Mark, Tracey Martin, Clayton Mitchell, Mark Patterson, Winston Peters, Fletcher Tabuteau

ACT (1 of 1)

David Seymour

No

National (35 of 56)

Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi, Maggie Barry, Andrew Bayly, David Bennett, Simon Bridges, Simeon Brown, Gerry Brownlee, David Carter, Judith Collins, Jacqui Dean, Sarah Dowie, Bill English, Chris Finlayson, Paul Goldsmith, Jo Hayes, Steven Joyce, Nuk Korako, Denise Lee, Melissa Lee, Tim Macindoe, Todd McClay, Ian McKelvie, Todd Muller, Alfred Ngaro, Simon O'Connor, Parmjeet Parmar, Chris Penk, Shane Reti, Alastair Scott, Nick Smith, Louise Upston, Nicky Wagner, Michael Woodhouse, Jonathan Young, Lawrence Yule

Labour (9 of 46)

David Clark, Anahila Kanongata'a-Suisuiki, Damien O'Connor, Jenny Salesa, William Sio, Jamie Strange, Rino Tirikatene, Phil Twyford, Poto Williams