MARTA to make an $8 billion pitch to change the face of Atlanta (Roswell: purchasing, to move)

[fourthwarden]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Oh, come on, jsvh. So the next time I buy something I can tell the seller to eat that sales tax, it's their responsibility?

I must say I am amazed at how folks leap to defend big business when it advocates putting more taxes on individuals while conveniently putting none on themselves.

Not to mention that those very taxes could provide substantial benefits to those who are urging other people to pay them. Shoot, if I'm planning a big real estate developer I'd love to get the taxpayer to build a new line to my project.

If you notice, a good bit of the advocacy has not been for the businesses, but for the current legislation. There's a difference that you seem to be ignoring.

I don't believe that the businesses are doing anything purposefully malevolent, at least nothing worse than what the state allows them to, and has given them the ability to. Really, the fact that a large collection of businesses that deal in road construction aren't advocating for the MARTA tax to be stricken and replaced with road funding for their own profit, going so far as to co-sponsor material promoting MARTA's expansion, makes me think they're actually being sincere, and don't have any hidden agendas. That is, beyond what the state already has in law.

Getting support for something directed at funding from directly from the people who are currently supporting you, will kill that support, and it will take more time than we can spare to get the political support to do anything about it. You will face lawsuits from certain businesses and municipalities and groups who believe that doing so, on such a massive scale, is an affront to everything they stand for. You will have to fight hard to keep that from killing the plans.

We can be as idealistic as we like arjay, but reality is what rules us, and what you're advocating for is not realistic.

[jsvh]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Oh, come on, jsvh. So the next time I buy something I can tell the seller to eat that sales tax, it's their responsibility?

I must say I am amazed at how folks leap to defend big business when it advocates putting more taxes on individuals while conveniently putting none on themselves.

Not to mention that those very taxes could provide substantial benefits to those who are urging other people to pay them. Shoot, if I'm planning a big real estate developer I'd love to get the taxpayer to build a new line to my project.

Yes, the sales tax is collected on the sale. But you do not pay it to the government. The business does. Many businesses do choose to include that sales tax in their price. But it is their choice. They are allowed to break it out if they want (unlike europe when most of the time they need to include it in the price).

I am not fan of "big business" or monopoly practices. Heck, I am free-market libertarian. I have been one to advocate that no government funding should go to transportation and it all should be privatized. And I don't necessarily think a sales tax is the best tax (I think user fees then land taxes are best). But, I have to acknowledge the flaws of the world we live in. If we are going to subsidize transportation, transit deserves its share. And portraying a sales tax as not adding any burden to businesses large and small is unfair.

[arjay57]

Look, if you guys want to roll over because Big Business seems so tough and they might object and make it hard and there's nothing you can do about it anyway, well, that's your business. Old coots like me will be gone soon enough.

But one day your sons and daughters may turn to you and ask, "Dad, why is it regular folks like us pay the MARTA tax every time we get a hamburger while the big corporations don't pay a dime? Aren't they the ones who own all the big buildings and businesses that benefit financially from MARTA? Didn't the people who lived back then at least try to make big business help pay for MARTA?"

Perhaps you'll find a way to explain. Tell them that the big guys were going to make it rough and that they'd never agree to pay the MARTA tax. Let them know there just wasn't any time to fight and there was no sense in getting the business community all riled up. We were young, you can say, and nobody told us what was really going on.

And who knows? Perhaps they will simply say, "We understand, dad, it's okay."

[Gulch]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Look, if you guys want to roll over because Big Business seems so tough and they might object and make it hard and there's nothing you can do about it anyway, well, that's your business. Old coots like me will be gone soon enough.

But one day your sons and daughters may turn to you and ask, "Dad, why is it regular folks like us pay the MARTA tax every time we get a hamburger while the big corporations don't pay a dime? Aren't they the ones who own all the big buildings and businesses that benefit financially from MARTA? Didn't the people who lived back then at least try to make big business help pay for MARTA?"

Perhaps you'll find a way to explain. Tell them that the big guys were going to make it rough and that they'd never agree to pay the MARTA tax. Let them know there just wasn't any time to fight and there was no sense in getting the business community all riled up. We were young, you can say, and nobody told us what was really going on.

And who knows? Perhaps they will simply say, "We understand, dad, it's okay."

You're paying the tax regardless. If it was strictly a corporate tax, the cost would simply get passed down to the consumer. Companies aren't going to absorb that expense out of the goodness of their hearts.

[primaltech]

Tax the cars/roads/gasoline, to pay for transit. Toll roads, etc. It's like a win-win. It funds all the transit expansions we need, and it directly encourages people to choose those transit options, and therefore helping to minimize worsening air quality.

[sedimenjerry]

Originally Posted by arjay57

Oh, come on, jsvh. So the next time I buy something I can tell the seller to eat that sales tax, it's their responsibility?

Actually just learned about this over winter. Look up tax incidence. When a tax raises the price of a product or service, the quantity demanded is less so companies can't sell as much. If companies want to increase the quantity demanded (and therefore sold) they'll need to reduce their price. In an even situation, a one dollar tax on a ten dollar good will be split 50/50. For something like gas, demand is very inelastic - change in price doesn't alter the quantity demanded as much. It took gas going from under $2 to over $4 a gallon for people to really change their habits. If a gas tax of a few pennies per gallon is implemented, people aren't going to change their demand so gas stations can keep the price near the same without much worry of losing customers, the commuter is still gonna fill up for the week. In this case, the consumer truly pays the majority of the tax.


Now look at clothing. For many items you can say demand is elastic, you don't need the super fancy $100 coat but it'd be nice. Say there's a $10 tax on that $100 coat so it's really $110 total. At that price, the quantity demand sharply decreases since there are many other options like the also nice $90 coat. Companies won't sell as much at this $110 price so they eat some of that tax and lower the price to $90. In this situation, you can absolutely tell the seller to eat that tax, you can shop around and get cheaper items.

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by sedimenjerry

Actually just learned about this over winter. Look up tax incidence. When a tax raises the price of a product or service, the quantity demanded is less so companies can't sell as much. If companies want to increase the quantity demanded (and therefore sold) they'll need to reduce their price. In an even situation, a one dollar tax on a ten dollar good will be split 50/50. For something like gas, demand is very inelastic - change in price doesn't alter the quantity demanded as much. It took gas going from under $2 to over $4 a gallon for people to really change their habits. If a gas tax of a few pennies per gallon is implemented, people aren't going to change their demand so gas stations can keep the price near the same without much worry of losing customers, the commuter is still gonna fill up for the week. In this case, the consumer truly pays the majority of the tax.


Now look at clothing. For many items you can say demand is elastic, you don't need the super fancy $100 coat but it'd be nice. Say there's a $10 tax on that $100 coat so it's really $110 total. At that price, the quantity demand sharply decreases since there are many other options like the also nice $90 coat. Companies won't sell as much at this $110 price so they eat some of that tax and lower the price to $90. In this situation, you can absolutely tell the seller to eat that tax, you can shop around and get cheaper items.

There's no doubt that tax consequences can be a negotiated factor in major transactions.

However, in the vast majority of consumer purchases that's not the case. Try popping into Mickey D's or Target or Kroger and tell them you're not paying sales tax and if they don't lower their prices you're going elsewhere.

[sumitsu]

Originally Posted by primaltech

Tax the cars/roads/gasoline, to pay for transit. Toll roads, etc. It's like a win-win. It funds all the transit expansions we need, and it directly encourages people to choose those transit options, and therefore helping to minimize worsening air quality.

Might have been a good use to which to put GA-400 toll money, if the toll booths were still in operation. This article indicates that the GA-400 tolls were collecting about $55,000/day at the time they were shut down; over the course of the 40-year lifespan of the half-penny sales tax being proposed, that's about $800 million, even absent any (likely) increase in amount collected per day.

Not enough to pay for the whole MARTA expansion project, to be sure, but a sizeable chunk regardless -- for example, enough to pay for the cost difference of HRT over BRT along the GA-400 corridor.

Oh well.

[jsvh]

arjay, but if one place has prices that at 8% cheaper (or whatever the sales tax happens to be), you would shop there all things equal, right?

And again, this is not about "big business". This is about letting voters choose. If you want to get rid of all transportation susbsidies so private transit companies have a fighting chance again, I will be right there with you. But otherwise we need to get transit a larger share of that subsudy if we want to continue to thrive as a metro.

Study: Atlanta Needs to Step Up its Transit Game Now

[arjay57]

Originally Posted by jsvh

And again, this is not about "big business". This is about letting voters choose. If you want to get rid of all transportation susbsidies so private transit companies have a fighting chance again, I will be right there with you. But otherwise we need to get transit a larger share of that subsudy if we want to continue to thrive as a metro.

I hear you saying that, jsvh, but why is that case? Why does big business -- which clearly is a huge financial beneficiary of mass transit -- allowed to get off the hook without paying one dime?

As I've said before, just add up the annual revenues of the entities represented by the leadership of the Metro chamber. It's got to be many, many, many billions. You're looking at Suntrust, Home Depot, Georgia Power, Cox, Lockheed, Coca-Cola, Cousins, Turner, Genuine Parts, Delta, Graphic packaging, IBM, Chick Fil A, the Falcons, Braves, Hawks, AT&T, CHOA, Emory, and on and on. These 100 or so companies are the absolute creme de la creme of Atlanta's economy and they are loaded with cash.

Why should they not contribute 1.5% of their annual expenditures? Or how about 1%, or .5%, or even .2%?

That's what they are vigorously advocating that the rest of us poor slobs do.