Thursday, June 23, 2011

The American suburbs are a giant Ponzi scheme | Grist


Not real wealth, just the illusion of wealth.Photo: John "K"
The American suburbs are a giant Ponzi scheme | Grist: "The reason we have this gap is because the public yield from the suburban development pattern -- the amount of tax revenue obtained per increment of liability assumed -- is ridiculously low. Over a life cycle, a city frequently receives just a dime or two of revenue for each dollar of liability. The engineering profession will argue, as ASCE does, that we're simply not making the investments necessary to maintain this infrastructure. This is nonsense. We've simply built in a way that is not financially productive."