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Did anyone here this story on KUOW this morning? I couldn't help but think to myself, "Wait, aren't these the assholes that vote against all taxes and all government services like it's their job?" If so, they deserve every lovely road and traffic backup they receive.
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Apr 13, 2015 14:43
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Solkanar512 posted:Did anyone here this story on KUOW this morning? Yes and no. I've spent the past decade commuting on those roads and the problem is three fold. King County urban growth boundaries are forcing east side towns to build densely instead of just building up slowly along infrastructure, King County and the state largely refuses as a result to connect these increasingly dense areas with roads that could support them because hey that's rural area we don't need to support them. Secondly the problem is a lot of these people are commuting into Seattle, Bellevue, Redmond and Everett because that's where they can work, Issaquah and Sammamish are exceedingly rich and have failed to invest anything in any traffic mitigation in the east/south directions. Because as long as people from Seattle Redmond and Bellevue can get to them and feed them tax money gently caress everyone else. Maple valley has been trying to get the County to invest in SR-169 for over a decade now would could help make the entire story moot but FYGM is pretty strong in WA investment in infrastructure. Thirdly, yes all the libertarians live on the east side, and do vote against taxes, but almost all traffic improvement money is collected at the state level and these small towns (ultimately Issaquah and Sammamish included) have no money to make these improvements. Its not part of their budgets and the state and WSDOT politics are pretty much 100% responsible for how things are. This will increasingly become a problem as people move to the east side to try and live in the Seattle area while being in the proper metro area is too expensive.
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Apr 13, 2015 15:39
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The story also implies that cities got more of the money which is a hilarious oversight because the cities never ended up with that money, it just disappeared into the state general fund. On that note if you've seen the republican state senate budget and want to know what a death cult designed budget looks like you should be overjoyed. I need to remember to quote à city lobbyist's take on how hilarious out of touch it is on his weekly update.
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Apr 13, 2015 15:44
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To quote from the article:quote:Why is there so little money? The recession bears some of the blame, during which property values fell almost 40 percent. They've since risen again, but property taxes, which also fell, have not been able to recover, because state law only allows them to rise 1% a year. It'll take almost 40 years for them to achieve their pre-recession levels. At that rate, it'll take the county at least 40 years to shake off the recession's contraction. The lovely funding resulting in lovely utilities is by design by the state.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:19
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The money simply isn't available to the DOT on a state level. King County is feeling the bite, but so are counties all over Washington. Counties and cities have been mitigating the issue by funding maintenance and creating construction projects themselves, but it's insufficient and obviously King County isn't going to do that sort of thing anyway. Fundamentally all this sprawl is unsustainable, and this is but one example of why. If you decide to buy a house 35 miles from the nearest school, and aren't willing or able to set up a local schoolhouse for your kids, then invest in a homeschooling program. I'm not going to shed tears that your completely self-imposed 70 mile daily commute is a grind.
Kaal fucked around with this message at 16:32 on Apr 13, 2015 |
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Apr 13, 2015 16:24
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Kaal posted:The money simply isn't available to the DOT on a state level. King County is feeling the bite, but so are counties all over Washington. Counties and cities have been mitigating the issue by funding maintenance and creating construction projects themselves, but it's insufficient and obviously King County isn't going to do that sort of thing anyway. Fundamentally all this sprawl is unsustainable, and this is but one example of why. If you decide to buy a house 35 miles from the nearest school, and aren't willing or able to set up a local schoolhouse for your kids, then invest in a homeschooling program. I'm not going to shed tears that your completely self-imposed 70 mile daily commute is a grind. She didn't buy a house 35 miles from the closest school. Her kids goes to school in Bellevue and she moved to Maple Valley. There is nothing stopping her from enrolling her children in MV schools.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:31
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Bucket Joneses posted:She didn't buy a house 35 miles from the closest school. Her kids goes to school in Bellevue and she moved to Maple Valley. There is nothing stopping her from enrolling her children in MV schools. Oh wow, that definitely makes it worse. Yeah no sympathy. If she wants to bring her family together then she should try sending her kids to the schools in her town and engage in their community. If she'd rather commute her kids for two hours than put them into the local schools, then the commute must not be that bad (for her personally I mean; it's pretty bad for society as a whole). It sucks for the people along the parallel rural roads, but probably the solution is to control access to those roads or limit their usefulness to thru traffic. Even if Washington had all the money in the world, it would be completely irresponsible to convert those country service lanes into traffic corridors. Kaal fucked around with this message at 16:49 on Apr 13, 2015 |
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Apr 13, 2015 16:38
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Gerund posted:To quote from the article: That's what jumped out at me. The number 1 problem in this state is our funding situation, mainly because too many people buy into starve-the-beast nonsense and go out of their way to hobble governments' ability to raise funds. Is rural King County that much cheaper than suburban King County? Or are these people who want all the benefits of living near a city without having to live near people? e: Oh she's sending her kids that far. Yeah, no sympathy. If you want the better school system, move your rear end there. Or maybe we should have a better funding system for schools that doesn't keep the majority of the money in rich districts. foobardog fucked around with this message at 16:44 on Apr 13, 2015 |
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Apr 13, 2015 16:40
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foobardog posted:Or are these people who want all the benefits of living near a city without having to live near people? Bingo. They want Sounders and Mariners and big concerts and bar hopping on weekends but also 3 acres and Get Off My Land.
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Apr 13, 2015 16:44
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Its a very weird case because MV has what's considered one of the best school districts in the State, (very white and affluent, 'natch) It makes me feel gross because that attitude is not the norm for residents of MV, probably the only thing they all agree on is how great the school district is, they even passed a bond to remodel the entire district and build the 7th largest highschool in the country last year. (Full disclosure I work in the local government of these East Side cities)
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Apr 13, 2015 17:01
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I'm gonna be honest: if I were on a jury for a murder trial for a couple of kids, and they said they killed their mom during hour two of their two-hour daily one-way commute home... those kids are getting off for justifiable homicide.
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Apr 13, 2015 23:51
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Maple Valley might as well be Hoquiam compared to Issaquah and Sammammish. Lots of people without money there, so let's dick them over on the bus route while we're at it.
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Apr 14, 2015 01:30
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Seattle business raises its minimum wage to 70k, partially funded by a CEO pay cut. The only part of the article that made me chuckle was the part about making it possible for employees to buy a house. Right-click, open in private browser because it's the New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/14/b...v=top-news&_r=0
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Apr 14, 2015 14:53
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I like how he differentiates himself from the employees by calling them "regular people".
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Apr 14, 2015 15:38
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Thanatosian posted:I'm gonna be honest: if I were on a jury for a murder trial for a couple of kids, and they said they killed their mom during hour two of their two-hour daily one-way commute home... those kids are getting off for justifiable homicide. As a kid who commuted from Port Orchard to Tacoma for high school (before the 2nd narrows bridge, mind you!), I can understand avoiding a terrible school district and adding a bit of a commute. But it sounds like the place she moved to had a perfectly fine school district, so I don't get her intentions.
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Apr 14, 2015 15:51
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seiferguy posted:As a kid who commuted from Port Orchard to Tacoma for high school (before the 2nd narrows bridge, mind you!), I can understand avoiding a terrible school district and adding a bit of a commute. But it sounds like the place she moved to had a perfectly fine school district, so I don't get her intentions. Since she's forgoing MV for Bellevue, I imagine she buys into the more East Coast connections=success narrative: that somehow being friends with the daughter of the VP of Microsoft is going to turn into some peach of an opportunity down the road. Now if only she could drive down a road to get there, she'd be golden!
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Apr 14, 2015 16:11
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Bucket Joneses posted:I like how he differentiates himself from the employees by calling them "regular people". I'll forgive him confusing "regular" with "average" on account of this being a real stand up thing to do for his employees.
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Apr 14, 2015 16:22
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Bucket Joneses posted:I like how he differentiates himself from the employees by calling them "regular people". lol, really? *That* is what you get from what he did?
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Apr 14, 2015 17:47
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Mrit posted:lol, really? *That* is what you get from what he did? That and this  and this  Guy in front: "I already made 70k" 
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Apr 14, 2015 18:03
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I love the idea and think it's really cool but I'm interested to see if he sees enough return to remain solvent.
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Apr 14, 2015 18:25
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Bucket Joneses posted:I love the idea and think it's really cool but I'm interested to see if he sees enough return to remain solvent. He's paying for it out of profit, so solvency isn't a problem unless the business becomes unprofitable.
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Apr 14, 2015 19:09
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And the thing is, as CEO, even with a salary of $70K, he's going to be alright, with stocks and investments and everything else he has going on financially. A lot of the big tech firm CEOs have a $1 salary and it would have been nice to see him go that route, but that might not be feasible given that he's not one of the giants. Overall he's probably not taking a huge hit by cutting his salary to use part of it to pay for his employees, but he's definitely doing a great thing by giving the money to people whose lives can be significantly more improved by it. On a related note, is it crazy to think that the CEO of ANY company should get no salary at all, but only compensation tied directly to the performance of the company, like stocks?
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Apr 14, 2015 19:56
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Flobbster posted:And the thing is, as CEO, even with a salary of $70K, he's going to be alright, with stocks and investments and everything else he has going on financially. A lot of the big tech firm CEOs have a $1 salary and it would have been nice to see him go that route, but that might not be feasible given that he's not one of the giants. Overall he's probably not taking a huge hit by cutting his salary to use part of it to pay for his employees, but he's definitely doing a great thing by giving the money to people whose lives can be significantly more improved by it. This is something of a perverse incentive in that it rewards CEOs for behavior that raises their stock price in the short-term without regard for what it does in the long-term.
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Apr 14, 2015 20:12
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Flobbster posted:And the thing is, as CEO, even with a salary of $70K, he's going to be alright, with stocks and investments and everything else he has going on financially. A lot of the big tech firm CEOs have a $1 salary and it would have been nice to see him go that route, but that might not be feasible given that he's not one of the giants. Overall he's probably not taking a huge hit by cutting his salary to use part of it to pay for his employees, but he's definitely doing a great thing by giving the money to people whose lives can be significantly more improved by it. Companies have bad years sometimes out of their control, so it would be tough to make that argument for a lot of companies. What should really happen is that CEO compensation is capped at a low multiple of the average employee salary, like 1.5x-2x, like it was in the 1960's and earlier. Not the 10-40x it is today. edit: Geeze, it's even worse: quote:The CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was 20-to-1 in 1965 and 29.9-to-1 in 1978, grew to 122.6-to-1 in 1995, peaked at 383.4-to-1 in 2000, and was 295.9-to-1 in 2013, far higher than it was in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s. mod sassinator fucked around with this message at 20:17 on Apr 14, 2015 |
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Apr 14, 2015 20:14
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Flobbster posted:On a related note, is it crazy to think that the CEO of ANY company should get no salary at all, but only compensation tied directly to the performance of the company, like stocks? Yes, because if you do that you're aligning the CEO's incentives almost entirely with short-term performance. This gives them overwhelmingly strong biases towards making decisions that are beneficial to stock prices or performance metrics in the near the near term, regardless of how harmful they may be for the organization over a longer period of time. e;fb
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Apr 14, 2015 20:20
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Pretty sure that company is not publicly traded or he'd be out on his rear end. I imagine they will see a nice uptick in business from local merchants though. Buy your grass fed quinoa burger and pay for it with an ethical credit card transaction.
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Apr 14, 2015 20:24
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Flobbster posted:And the thing is, as CEO, even with a salary of $70K, he's going to be alright, with stocks and investments and everything else he has going on financially. A lot of the big tech firm CEOs have a $1 salary and it would have been nice to see him go that route, but that might not be feasible given that he's not one of the giants. Overall he's probably not taking a huge hit by cutting his salary to use part of it to pay for his employees, but he's definitely doing a great thing by giving the money to people whose lives can be significantly more improved by it. When I was at Amazon a lot of the executives took a salary of like $89K, like it mattered.
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Apr 14, 2015 21:34
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Thanatosian posted:This is something of a perverse incentive in that it rewards CEOs for behavior that raises their stock price in the short-term without regard for what it does in the long-term. Thanks everyone, makes total sense. I was thinking in terms of "the CEO should be compensated based solely on how well they run the company because the buck stops with them", but I can see how they'd want to game such a system. Either way, I'd love to see more companies do what this guy did, but sadly this will probably be an isolated occurrence.
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Apr 15, 2015 01:38
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Thanatosian posted:This is something of a perverse incentive in that it rewards CEOs for behavior that raises their stock price in the short-term without regard for what it does in the long-term. That's why they typically don't give you stock benefits if you leave the company before a certain date. For example, Tim Cook get a million shares in Apple Stock but only if he's still at the company by 2021.
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Apr 15, 2015 01:43
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There was a proposal in some northern Euro country that mandates a maximum ratio of 12:1 for the highest and lowest earners at a company. IE if the junior poo poo-shoveler makes $10 an hour the CEO can only make $120. I support this.
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Apr 15, 2015 04:44
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Javid posted:There was a proposal in some northern Euro country that mandates a maximum ratio of 12:1 for the highest and lowest earners at a company. IE if the junior poo poo-shoveler makes $10 an hour the CEO can only make $120. I support this. Even if something like this were possible in the US (I doubt it), there would be some sort of exclusion for the service/retail sectors. Can't have the serfs living too well, can't we?
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Apr 15, 2015 05:04
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Javid posted:There was a proposal in some northern Euro country that mandates a maximum ratio of 12:1 for the highest and lowest earners at a company. IE if the junior poo poo-shoveler makes $10 an hour the CEO can only make $120. I support this. Mondragon Corporation, a federation of worker cooperatives, does this, and the ratios go from 3:1 to 12:1, with an average of 5:1. It can be done, and is certainly worth fighting for, but expect rich assholes to fight it with every breath they've got and paid shill they can hire.
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Apr 15, 2015 05:11
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MrKatharsis posted:Pretty sure that company is not publicly traded or he'd be out on his rear end. I imagine they will see a nice uptick in business from local merchants though. Buy your grass fed quinoa burger and pay for it with an ethical credit card transaction. Everyone knows grass fed quinoa is bland and tasteless. Real quinoa is fed on blood and bonemeal.
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Apr 15, 2015 05:17
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mod sassinator posted:Companies have bad years sometimes out of their control, so it would be tough to make that argument for a lot of companies. What should really happen is that CEO compensation is capped at a low multiple of the average employee salary, like 1.5x-2x, like it was in the 1960's and earlier. Not the 10-40x it is today. The other thing to remember is that it's not just the CEO getting paid way more money than before, it's all upper and middle management (though to a lesser degree in middle management). The % of costs in terms of management pay vs labor pay has shifted. The short-term thinking and focus extends well beyond the CEO, as upper management (and the higher reaches of middle management) makes more than enough that they only need to hold down their positions for a small number of year in order to live the rest of it comfortably (unless they are stupid and don't realize that they've got it made). Nobody in those positions will want to rock the boat and will be more than happy riding the company down the tubes if it comes to it.
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Apr 15, 2015 06:04
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Javid posted:There was a proposal in some northern Euro country that mandates a maximum ratio of 12:1 for the highest and lowest earners at a company. IE if the junior poo poo-shoveler makes $10 an hour the CEO can only make $120. I support this. edit: ok it was Switzerland but you're right, 12:1 highest:lowest. It lost quite badly though.
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Apr 15, 2015 07:50
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Uranium Phoenix posted:Mondragon Corporation, a federation of worker cooperatives, does this, and the ratios go from 3:1 to 12:1, with an average of 5:1.
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Apr 15, 2015 11:20
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Uranium Phoenix posted:Mondragon Corporation, a federation of worker cooperatives, does this, and the ratios go from 3:1 to 12:1, with an average of 5:1. Nah, all they'll do is make a holding company where all the upper management reside and all of the workers are "outsourced" to fully owned subsidiaries. 12 times minimum wage is above the SS cap so they can get some middle manager to be "CEO" with no issue.
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Apr 15, 2015 13:27
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computer parts posted:Nah, all they'll do is make a holding company where all the upper management reside and all of the workers are "outsourced" to fully owned subsidiaries. Just extend the rule to subsidiaries and contractor firms used by the parent firm, up and down the chain. If companies don't like the paperwork they can go gently caress themselves for trying to play games in the first place.
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Apr 15, 2015 16:04
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computer parts posted:Nah, all they'll do is make a holding company where all the upper management reside and all of the workers are "outsourced" to fully owned subsidiaries. Anytime you find yourself thinking "Well, it'd be great if we could implement this progressive policy, but companies would just find a loophole so we shouldn't even try" just remind yourself that it is 100% possible to find and close all loopholes and prevent all these shenanigans and actually write a really good law that works and then enforce it. Like when my family members tell me it'd be impossible to ever eliminate legalized bribery (lobbying) in the US, because "human nature". Yet all the humans in Europe manage to avoid having legalized bribery! They even send their prime ministers to prison when they break the law!
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Apr 15, 2015 21:21
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reading posted:Anytime you find yourself thinking "Well, it'd be great if we could implement this progressive policy, but companies would just find a loophole so we shouldn't even try" just remind yourself that it is 100% possible to find and close all loopholes and prevent all these shenanigans and actually write a really good law that works and then enforce it. Agreed. It certainly is possible to eliminate legalized bribery - just illegalize it. Now it is no longer legal. It isn't going to get rid of every element of corruption in American politics, but it's an excellent place to start. Laws against theft don't prevent all acts of theft, but they do discourage it from happening and work to protect victims and punish perpetrators. I certainly wouldn't prefer that we had no laws against theft in spite of their imperfection.
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Apr 15, 2015 21:26
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