Another reason Allegheny Co needs a coup d'etat (Pittsburgh, Economy: credit, income)

[squarian]

Historic Property Tax Credit: Layering Good Stuff On Top of Crap - Keystone Politics

The biggest issue is the state’s municipal finance policy. Other states have County-level tax bases, so outmigration to the suburbs hasn’t hit urban tax bases as hard in those places. PA and other “little box” government states in the northeast aren’t like that. When wealthier people move from cities to the suburbs, their earned income taxes go with them, and cities alone are on the hook for the legacy costs of aging infrastructure, older workforces and pensions, lower-income residents who need more government services, etc. The pain is not getting shared fairly within regions.

[Velvet Jones]

Originally Posted by squarian

Historic Property Tax Credit: Layering Good Stuff On Top of Crap - Keystone Politics

You can't have centralized taxes until you have centralized government, otherwise the little fiefdoms in the area would just spend us much as possible. This is another example where democracy doesn't work, as every attempt to solve the problem is shot down. If you look at the history of the area you would see that "the people" actually wanted it this way. Many of these little munis actually split off of larger townships. Pittsburgh itself is one of the few places where consolidation occurred, but most other larger townships split up over funding and resource allocation.

[BrianTH]

The head of the snake is the state, not the county.

[Garvdog]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

The head of the snake is the state, not the county.

Agreed- isn't that why PA is called a "Commonwealth"?