Unfortunately it seems that government does not have the spine to enforce meaningful punishments against the tech giants, and that status quo seems unlikely to change over this kind of breach.
Curios why? If someone wants it for an extra 3 days/nights, shoulder shrug take uber home = more money. Someone cancels, drive to work. Someone has it? Uber = more money. Someone cancels during work, drive home like normal. Not following why this is absurd. I think it would be absurd to just sit it in the lot for 10 hours (2 extra hours since I am sucking up those sweet tips) - or take buses home and have a 2 hour commute?
Interesting that you put it like that, no income tax, rather than optimal services for the tax paid. Do you consider that as a richer person you should directly contribute financially to the improvement of the society that you live in at all; or is it that you see property tax as a fairer way to do that? (Or something else?)
I'm not the GP, but I don't think that paying more taxes is the best way to improve society. I'm not rich, but as someone making above median wages and living in a low-COL area with no state income taxes, I put my money where my mouth is by contributing an amount roughly equal to my annual federal income tax to local charities that provide a variety of services to people in need.
Thanks for responding, if I may probe further -- is it that you think the state can't provide the services those charities do, or that your particular local incarnation of it won't (ever?)?
Where I am, a poor UK city, the Christian Churches provide a lot of services to the poor (homeless shelters, food banks, pensioners meals, friendship clubs, pregnancy counselling, family counselling, pastoral care) often with referral by front line council workers. Most of those services are free at the point of need (only family counselling is charged for IIRC) but couldn't operate on those budgets as council services -- largely because they rely on donations of buildings from the Churches, and donation of time from volunteers. The council has to rent, and has to pay at least minimum wage.
So, in a way these essential community services work outside the state machine doing something that in a socialist setting government is expected to do.
I can see this works inasmuch as those services exist, when they seemingly wouldn't otherwise, but the payment for those services isn't as fairly distributed as if it were acquired by taxation IMO. Also, in theory on a state level you save optimise service provision to save administration and logistics costs; whilst local piecemeal approaches can be relatively expensive ... but then in practice government seems to add layers of bureaucracy and expensive management ...
It's a complicated topic and tough to do it justice in a brief post, but a couple brief thoughts anyway. I believe that I as an individual have a moral obligation to provide aid to the poor. I do not believe that government has that responsibility. Ultimately the government is funded via taxation backed by the threat of force. As such, taxing some citizens to provide aid to others is a form of legislating morality. I think the legislation of morality is warranted primarily in the negative, that is, to prohibit things such as murder, theft, assault, etc.
Secondly, I believe that aid to the poor is most effective and of greater benefit to both the giver and the recipient when it is done in a relational context (which is not to say that aid is given directly from the giver to the recipient, just that it's localized enough that the givers and recipients are in the same community). The giver can see the tangible effects of his generosity and the recipient can see the care shown by the giver. By its nature, government aid is impersonal and therefore less beneficial. The "givers" in that case, who are "giving" often only under compulsion, often feel exploited and resentful. Many recipients develop a sense of entitlement since there's no direct connection between the aid they receive and their fellow citizens who provided that aid.
I do agree with you that taking government out of the aid business would result in less uniform funding for aid, but I think that's a lesser problem than forcing it on everyone. I'm on the board of a local charity and I see the private donors who fund it, 95% of whom are are middle or upper-middle class, and I'm pretty amazed by their generosity. I wish awareness of those kinds of things were greater.
As a Massachusetts resident, our neighboring state, New Hampshire has no income tax. I was working at a place many years ago, that moved to along a major N/S highway that made commuting from out of state more feasible.
Those at work who looked into moving there have noted, the commute is much worse, income tax is negated a lot by high property taxes. When the company started downsizing it was noted that those in NH had significantly worse unemployment benefits. Some feel its worth it, but a lot don't. I think we had one person move.
I’m in FL too, but not the same city/county. Curious what you mean by additional property tax? Is that something in all of FL or just that county? (Maybe you were referencing Nashville)?
Remote SE here - I live in the Sierra Nevadas in Truckee, CA. I chose to live here because its close to skiing/hiking, easy to get to SF for work once a month, and easy for people from the bay to visit. Plus Reno airport within 40 mins and I got a 3400sqft house for the same price I paid for a 1br in SF.
