23 hours ago, GCrites80s said:

 

Tons of cities were still run by Republicans in the '80s unlike now. You make it sound like it is today when only military towns will vote in Republican mayors. And the "progessive" Democrats from back then don't compare to today's since everything was always being dragged back in the conservative direction back in those days.

 

As far as the Rhino scheme goes that why we don't trust the private sector with anything. 

 

I would argue that any progressive movement is still being dragged back to the center right. There arguably is no serious, organized progressive movement in America. Or at least not a very successful one. But it makes for a great and convenient boogeyman. 

2 hours ago, jonoh81 said:

 

This is either incredible gaslighting or completely oblivious. Systemic racism continues to persist in most institutions, whether it is legally sanctioned or not. Your own party *loves* systemic racism in voting laws, among other things, and gerrymanders away minority power. And that's just for starters. So let's not pretend like it's been a magical last 5 decades in which all or even most discrimination is gone. 

jonboy - you have always been good at casting blame at everyone else yet letting your own side off the hook. In reality, many of the very cities who rebel against the policies of the 80s were governed by the same progressive class of that day. They were bad policies then but your progressive buddies champion them as good policy and now when they backfire you seek to blame systemic racism or whatever fictitious buzzword that the progressive establishment wants to push at that moment. The fact of the matter is that while there may be bad policies, they are not necessarily there to support "white supremacy", keep  minorities in the ghetto, steal and appropriate all ideas created by minorities for the benefit of white people, etc. etc. etc. I know you like to believe this garbage and I am happy to sell you some quality swampland in Florida for a premium because of it, but in reality, the rhetoric from people like Aftab is just not reality. 

14 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

jonboy - you have always been good at casting blame at everyone else yet letting your own side off the hook. In reality, many of the very cities who rebel against the policies of the 80s were governed by the same progressive class of that day. They were bad policies then but your progressive buddies champion them as good policy and now when they backfire you seek to blame systemic racism or whatever fictitious buzzword that the progressive establishment wants to push at that moment. The fact of the matter is that while there may be bad policies, they are not necessarily there to support "white supremacy", keep  minorities in the ghetto, steal and appropriate all ideas created by minorities for the benefit of white people, etc. etc. etc. I know you like to believe this garbage and I am happy to sell you some quality swampland in Florida for a premium because of it, but in reality, the rhetoric from people like Aftab is just not reality. 

 

You just seem to be saying a lot of words here without actually saying much of anything. What "policies of the 80s" did cities rebel against? And which bad ones did supposed progressive cities champion? 

 

I feel like you don't have any real connections or relationships with a single minority or minority group in America if you truly believe there is no systemic racism or discrimination anymore. 

6 hours ago, jonoh81 said:

 

There is a reason that economic divides continue to widen and the middle class is going down, and it has nothing to do with one's work ethic.

 

The world is full of quitters. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On 3/24/2023 at 4:46 PM, Brutus_buckeye said:

The war on crime was created to combat crime. As time went by, we learned a little bit more about what we should be prosecuting and what we shouldn't be prosecuting. If the war on crime was just another creation to apply Jim Crow restrictions in a more subtle way, then you would not have minorities serving in power positions in cities where they supposedly are enforcing such racist rules and regulations.  The world is a tough place and there are certainly a lot of inequalities in society and there are some people who have more advantages over others. I get that, however, if you look at all of the problems of society and try and apply it through some lens that society and all structures of society are inherently racist (they aren't) then you will miss opportunities to truly solve the problem or pull yourself out of an environment that is keeping you from succeeding in the first place. 

 

“To see those, those monkeys from those African countries—damn them, they’re still uncomfortable wearing shoes!”

 

-Ronald Reagan

 

"You start out in 1954 by saying, “Ni**er, ni**er, ni**er.” By 1968 you can’t say “ni**er”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “Ni**er, ni**er.”

 

-Lee Atwater 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, Lazarus said:

 

The world is full of quitters. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And arrogant elitists who have no idea what struggles the average person actually deals with. Case in point. 

Edited March 27, 20232 yr by jonoh81

15 hours ago, jonoh81 said:

 

You just seem to be saying a lot of words here without actually saying much of anything. What "policies of the 80s" did cities rebel against? And which bad ones did supposed progressive cities champion? 

 

I feel like you don't have any real connections or relationships with a single minority or minority group in America if you truly believe there is no systemic racism or discrimination anymore. 

That is a pretty ignorant statement on your end considering you know nothing about me. For starters, I provide housing for a lot of former felons who had drug trafficking arrests when they were in their teens and 20s and have turned their lives around so I see the results of these policies first hand. 

 

Regarding the progressive policies of the 1980s. While not progressive now, in the 1980s cities and their mayors got in line and embraced the whole war on crack. Go back in time and in the vacuum it made sense. There were many people, especially minorities in the cities who were suffering watching family members succumb to the scourge of crack cocaine. People were dying, becoming addicted and it was a drug that was preying on the poor.  While the false narrative that is being bandied around today is that the war on crack was guided by racist policies that arose out of a new Jim Crow mentality (since you could no longer redline, overtly discriminate) in reality that was not accurate.  The crack epidemic was a problem in the 80s and early 90s precisely because unlike cocaine (which was an expensive drug) it was a cheap drug that was manufactured easily and affordable to the masses. Yes, it would have been great if the police and Feds could have gone after the big cocaine kingpins in the US, but those were much harder targets to reach (especially given how due process laws work). There was a cry out on the street for tough policing amongst the people who lived in the poorest neighborhoods to keep the drugs out of their neighborhood because they affected their children and grandchildren the most. Mayors of large cities were fine with these policies because in one sense, it promised to make the streets safer.  The tough on crack laws, eventually led to the 3 strikes your out policies that I think were misguided as they ended up incarcerating a bunch of young men for low level drug felonies who saw selling crack as an opportunity and potential way to earn money for their own advancement (it was probably a poorly calculated decision on their end but when you have lack of options it becomes a reasonable one).  So yes, the policies went too far, and over time, the results have been studied and society has made changes to redress these matters.  Jonboy, even your good friend Donald Trump even signed a bill to provide reforms for some of these policies from the 80s and 90s that failed.  So, you have the wisdom of time to allow people to reflect on policies that did not work, but the main foundation for your argument, that these policies were put in place primarily out of racist intent and were specifically designed as a way to further hold minorities, especially African Americans back is a false premise that is perpetuated by progressive politicians who either do not understand the history or want to mislead those susceptible to the false narrative. 

 

 

4 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

Regarding the progressive policies of the 1980s. While not progressive now, in the 1980s cities and their mayors got in line and embraced the whole war on crack. Go back in time and in the vacuum it made sense.

Absolutely, there were both Democratic and Republican mayors in the 1980s who would do anything to stop the crack epidemic. 

But "progressives" were not in anything close to a majority in the Democratic Party then or now.  It is laughable to suggest that mayors at the time were seeking to adopt "progressive" policies.

 

8 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

The crack epidemic was a problem in the 80s and early 90s precisely because unlike cocaine (which was an expensive drug) it was a cheap drug that was manufactured easily and affordable to the masses.

Yes, crack was cheaper (and more so it was just the new kid on the block), but it was decidedly not cheaper to manufacture.   Crack is made from powdered cocaine -- you make powdered cocaine, then you add a strong base and water and heat it to remove the water and produce a solid form of cocaine.  Extra steps, extra energy -- crack is more expensive to make than powdered cocaine.  What made crack cheaper was not the manufacturing process.  And in fact it might be a myth that crack was significantly cheaper.  https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/9519487/

 

11 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

So, you have the wisdom of time to allow people to reflect on policies that did not work, but the main foundation for your argument, that these policies were put in place primarily out of racist intent and were specifically designed as a way to further hold minorities, especially African Americans back is a false premise that is perpetuated by progressive politicians who either do not understand the history or want to mislead those susceptible to the false narrative.

While crack was creating an epidemic in poor African-American communities, and those communities (and the people who cared about them) were desperate to find a solution, there certainly were some politicians who were more than happy to crack down on those populations in ways that they would not have approved of if applied to white populations.  That may be why there was such widespread bipartisan support for those policies.  At the same time, I agree that it was far from universal -- mostly people were just desperate to end the epidemic, no matter what.  So while I agree that overall the policies of stricter enforcement of crack vs. powder were not primarily initiated for racist reasons (these policies were not put in place primarily out of racist intent), a racial-biased impact certainly resulted and the consequences persist.

4 minutes ago, Foraker said:

At the same time, I agree that it was far from universal -- mostly people were just desperate to end the epidemic, no matter what.  So while I agree that overall the policies of stricter enforcement of crack vs. powder were not primarily initiated for racist reasons (these policies were not put in place primarily out of racist intent), a racial-biased impact certainly resulted and the consequences persist.

I will agree that the policies certainly had a disparate impact on the African American male community, but if you go back 30 years ago, this concept was not on the radar of policymakers. I do not thinking holding them accountable for failing to realize this is realistic, plus I do not think that such disparate impact is realized unless these policies actually happened and you could study the impact in real numbers and real life examples. I also would argue that even though there happened to be a disparate impact, that is not the same as stating that such a policy amounted to systemic racism because ultimately, you have to have a racist intent when you put the policy in place to have created such a systemic policy.  

I think the systemic racism term is vastly overused amongst progressives and as usual, they dilute the true meaning of the phrase and its impact. There are a few examples where systemic policies were put in place out of racist intent but those are few and far between today and often relics of the Jim Crow era. Probably the best example I would cite is the design of the interstate system with a lack of interchanges through minority neighborhoods limiting opportunity and growth to those neighborhoods. But again, those policies were put in place at a time (namely the 50s and 60s when such overt racism was still part of society and especially government)

9 hours ago, jonoh81 said:

 

And arrogant elitists who have no idea what struggles the average person actually deals with. Case in point. 

Again an ignorant statement on your end by someone who does not know anything about @Lazarus. He is someone who has hustled and saved and searched for opportunities to achieve. He has never had anything handed to him. His perspective is from someone who has had to hustle and work hard his entire life. Before trying to make generalizations about the speaking, maybe learn a little about their background first. 

On 3/24/2023 at 10:35 AM, Lazarus said:

https://www.wvxu.org/politics/2023-03-23/mayor-aftab-pureval-answers-questions-tax-abatement-reform-nathan-ivey

 

Home ownership is not a significant wealth-building tool in the Midwest and most Cincinnatians lost money on homes within the city limits during the postwar decades.  The 2008 housing crash was caused in part by efforts to get minorities on the so-called "property ladder" in the 1990s.  No redlining map has ever been found for Cincinnati, and even if it did occur, it's completely irrelevant in a city that was in steady decline from the 1960s until roughly 2015.  

 

Aftab goes full Jabroni. 

 

So, I usually stay out of the Cincinnati threads because my mental map of Ohio along I-71 south ends at Grove City and everything beyond that is just "Here Be Dragons."  But this is interesting to me because we have a residential tax abatement program here in Akron and it has been slightly controversial but hasn't had what I'd call a major opposition that had a serious chance of repealing it.  It's become more publicly salient because of some large residential developments within the city limits recently--but at the edge of the city limits where it will tend to look closer to sprawl in terms of land use--maybe slightly higher density than true sprawl in the townships but still single-use, autocentric, etc., and of course with 15 years before those houses start to feed property taxes into the school system.  I also see from that link that Cincinnati has a separate program for "commercial" tax abatements, which despite the name, also includes large (5+ unit) multifamily residential, so commercial developers would be using that alternative program; in Akron, I don't think we separate those, I think we just have one form of abatement theoretically available to everyone, but in general, it tends to be large developers that maximize the use of it.

 

Elsewhere in the link you posted, it looks like the same phenomenon was happening in Cincinnati with their abatement(s), and Pureval is restructuring it so that new value added in wealthier Cincinnati neighborhoods doesn't qualify for the same length or value of abatement.

 

I'm unclear what your actual stance here is: Are you saying that these tax abatements should be repealed entirely?  Left as they were, including for the wealthier neighborhoods?  Expanded across the board?

 

As I'm pretty sure I've said multiple times on the Personal Finance thread, I agree with you on home equity being a deeply suboptimal savings mechanism, and I have maybe 10% of my own net worth in my primary residence.  Homeownership is expensive (even before the last few years in which the cost to get any kind of skilled tradesman out to do repair work skyrocketed), time-consuming, high-risk for those who cannot afford to own a home without committing a substantial portion of their income to a mortgage, illiquid, and non-portable.  I get it.  But I'm having trouble making the jump from that to assuming any particular position on property tax abatements.  You say that homeownership is a lousy wealth-building strategy, and I agree, but most poorer residents don't own their homes, and even the slightly-less-poor ones who do will be unlikely to take much advantage of programs like this.  Honestly, no matter how they're structured, I'd be stunned to learn that any more than a tiny sliver of these abatements are claimed by individual owner-occupiers at all.  You're looking at small-scale local flippers at best, and more likely large developers with staff dedicated to the compliance work.

^ Cincinnati does have 2 rebates. The need for commercial was started around 20 years ago in an effort to get more residents downtown and encourage apartment development in older vacant downtown buildings. That has worked very well and it has not been the most controversial. 

 

The residential credit was a bit more controversial because it was city wide. It was also needed because they wanted to stop the exodus of residents to the burbs. The controversy was that it applied to all areas equally and there were many wealthier individuals who used it to do tear downs and redevelopments so the complaint was that the tax rebates were going to areas that did not necessarily need the rebate or areas that were not struggling for redevelopment. 

 

There is certainly an argument to be made on both ends of the residential issue, but that is the one that has caused the most controversy because unlike commercial, it pretty much applies across the board and also for commercial developments, council etc. has more power to force a developer to build a project in a certain way to qualify for the tax rebate (they can force the developer to add a certain % of affordable units or limit the size and scope of a project, etc. to what council and the community may want in commercial). 

2 hours ago, Gramarye said:

Elsewhere in the link you posted, it looks like the same phenomenon was happening in Cincinnati with their abatement(s), and Pureval is restructuring it so that new value added in wealthier Cincinnati neighborhoods doesn't qualify for the same length or value of abatement.

 

 

The abatements began in the late 90s when the city was at rock bottom.  There was almost zero new construction of any type downtown or in the neighborhoods.  Vacant buildings and homes were all over the place.  

 

Luckily, Cincinnati did not adopt the form-based code that motivated large-scale death and destruction of Nashville's neighborhoods during the same time period, but there were nevertheless a few examples of historic homes sitting on large enough lots that existing code permitted construction of two or more new homes.  

 

The new construction has occurred almost entirely in eastern neighborhoods, which have always been the wealthier parts of the city.  I can't think of a *single* new home that has been built in Price Hill or anywhere on the west side. 

 

But here is the trap Aftab has laid for himself (or more likely his successor) - if the adjustment to the abatement program manages to motivate some new construction on the west side, we'll hear howls of "gentrification!" from the usual suspects. 

 

 

 

 

2 hours ago, Gramarye said:

Homeownership is expensive (even before the last few years in which the cost to get any kind of skilled tradesman out to do repair work skyrocketed), time-consuming, high-risk for those who cannot afford to own a home without committing a substantial portion of their income to a mortgage, illiquid, and non-portable.  

 

It's horrendously expensive.  Contractors are charging just about whatever they want.  There is always a $10,000 project looming in the mid-term (new roof, new furnace, retaining wall problem, etc.) but then items of a similar expense that can come absolutely out of nowhere and must be dealt with immediately.  If you don't have the cash or don't qualify for a loan, the home might be rendered unlivable and unsalvageable.  That's how thousands and thousands of homes ended up getting demolished all of there city - people didn't have the money to pay for repairs.  

 

But Aftab, Bill Clinton, etc., want to keep putting homes in the hands of people who can't afford to maintain them.  

 

 

 

 

Last furnace I had installed was $4,100 in 2022, good enough for 1,600 Sq. Ft. It would have been cheaper if it didn't need a propane kit. Had a boiler installed in another house in 2019 which was $9k.

23 minutes ago, Lazarus said:

 

It's horrendously expensive.  Contractors are charging just about whatever they want.  There is always a $10,000 project looming in the mid-term (new roof, new furnace, retaining wall problem, etc.) but then items of a similar expense that can come absolutely out of nowhere and must be dealt with immediately.  If you don't have the cash or don't qualify for a loan, the home might be rendered unlivable and unsalvageable.  That's how thousands and thousands of homes ended up getting demolished all of there city - people didn't have the money to pay for repairs.  

 

But Aftab, Bill Clinton, etc., want to keep putting homes in the hands of people who can't afford to maintain them.  

 

 

 

 

 

If it's anything like the VA program no they won't. The home condition requirements for that are extreme.

39 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

 

If it's anything like the VA program no they won't. The home condition requirements for that are extreme.

 

FHA and VA are similar in that they require a special inspection process.  A lot of sellers won't accept an FHA offer because they don't want to deal with the hassle.  

 

But there is no alternative if we hope for any success in enabling people who shouldn't buy homes to buy homes.  Someone who buys a house with a conventional mortgage can tap the equity created by their down payment to pay for an expensive repair.  With FHA/VA, there is basically zero down payment, meaning there is no way to pay for an urgent repair that appears in the first 3-5 years of home ownership.  

 

The great folly is that people tap their credit during good times to do kitchen/bathroom remodels, or to buy RVs or boats, instead of saving that last-chance money for a real emergency.  Then a real emergency happens and their financial life spirals out of control.  

 

I temped at Nationwide Insurance back in 2007.  I processed early retirement account withdrawals.  Some of the withdrawals were for medical bills, but a lot were for toys.  Pools, jet skis, etc.  

 

 

 

People back then bought into the lie that if you just "work hard" those things will come. When that didn't happen (as it often does, and especially in the late 2000s) they snapped and withdrew from the system they like and understand the least in order to get those things. "Boomer Entitlement." That's why all those toys are aimed at Boomers now. They barely make sport quads at all; it's all UTVs now. Sportbikes are a tiny fraction of the market; it's all touring bikes and Harleys for people with tons of free time.

15 hours ago, GCrites80s said:

People back then bought into the lie that if you just "work hard" those things will come.

How is this a lie? If you work hard good things will come. If you do not work hard, then good things do not come. 

Yes, it is true that if you bust your a$$ at McDonalds for 30 years flipping burgers 60 hours a week, you are likely not going to make multi-millions. There is more to it than pure hard labor, it is about thinking and acting strategically, but that also takes work and effort. 

If you work toward a lofty goal, and work hard toward it, while there is no guarantee you will achieve that goal, at some point you will be much closer to achieving the goal than if you did not put the effort in from the start. 

 

43 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

If you work hard good things will come.

 

43 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

 

If you work toward a lofty goal, and work hard toward it, while there is no guarantee you will achieve that goal, at some point you will be much closer to achieving the goal than if you did not put the effort in from the start.

 

So the first statement is only sometimes true, and I agree with the second.

 

Lots and lots of random unpredictable events can wreck a lot of hard work and good intentions.  An accident caused by an uninsured motorist. A car that breaks down at the wrong time. Cancer.  Natural disasters.  Building a business only to see the market shift.  Being the last guy or the first guy laid off from a good job -- maybe right after you bought your first house.  A lot can wreck years and years of hard work.  So sure, you should work hard.  But there is zero guarantee that hard work is all you need to escape poverty. 

 

And sure, not working hard means you will never escape poverty.  Because it's so much fun, why leave the party?

37 minutes ago, Foraker said:

Lots and lots of random unpredictable events can wreck a lot of hard work and good intentions.  An accident caused by an uninsured motorist. A car that breaks down at the wrong time. Cancer.  Natural disasters.  Building a business only to see the market shift.  Being the last guy or the first guy laid off from a good job -- maybe right after you bought your first house.  A lot can wreck years and years of hard work.  So sure, you should work hard.  But there is zero guarantee that hard work is all you need to escape poverty. 

You are right, there are no guarantees in life. Luck does play a role, but 90% of the time you need to make your own luck. Sure there are things like cancer, stroke, major accidents etc you cannot control, but the odds are in your favor that if you put in the work you will achieve your goal or get closer to achieving such goal and less likely to end up in poverty. Yes, in life nothing is guaranteed, but I like the odds of working hard better than the odds of not. 

 

I remember a few years ago, I was at a ski resort and there was a reunion of Stanford MBA's there. A lot of them were budding entrepreneurs. One individual I was speaking with had been working for 2 years on a product to revolutionize the healthcare billing industry. He had passionately put 2 years into building this database for his dream job. The problem was, within 5 minutes of talking with him, it was obvious his "dream" product was a giant failure as he completely misread who is actual customer was. I made friends with this guy and have loosely kept in touch with him over the years and even after that "dream" business never took launch, he did not let it get him down and he went to work with a few partners on another healthcare startup to which he found better success. Chasing his dream and putting in a ton of hard work may have resulted in 2 years of failure but he still ended closer to achieving his dream, he just could not see that opportunity at the time being so far away from it. 

 

As a society, it feels like a lot of people have completely given up on all hope which is a shame. 

Edited March 28, 20232 yr by Brutus_buckeye

Supply and demand coupled with industry trends don't give one iota about your bootstraps. There's more to an industry than just you. People who fix broken stuff all day struggle with this since concept everything is always breaking until that thing they know how to fix no longer exists. Then they learn it very quickly. 

13 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

Supply and demand coupled with industry trends don't give one iota about your bootstraps. There's more to an industry than just you. People who fix broken stuff all day struggle with this since concept everything is always breaking until that thing they know how to fix no longer exists. Then they learn it very quickly. 

There is, but you find opportunity through your trials and errors. If you try something it may not succeed but it may open the door to another opportunity. Supply and demand may not care about your bootstraps but your bootstraps are what allows you to find the next opportunity

1 hour ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

There is, but you find opportunity through your trials and errors.

This is where the issue is for me.  Some people are born into situations where they can try and fail a million times with no real consequences.  Others are born in zip codes that could mean you get a few trials and errors, but they set you back and could ruin you.  It's okay to have a gap, just not one that is as severe as it is today.

Bootstrapping and time poverty are very bad for your health so it's easy to wind up dead if it fails. The obituaries in Columbus used to be full of men in their 50s due to it.

^it appears as though Aftab has breezed through life so far, if his Wikipedia article is to be believed.  It really goes out of its way to make him look like he's got a sense of humor, but we all know from the KC Chiefs debacle that he can't come up with his own jokes and was fooled into reading a ridiculous taunt penned by a staffer.  

 

He's the opposite of a Daly in Chicago or Cianci in Providence or Menino in Boston.  

 

 

4 minutes ago, Lazarus said:

^it appears as though Aftab has breezed through life so far, if his Wikipedia article is to be believed.  It really goes out of its way to make him look like he's got a sense of humor, but we all know from the KC Chiefs debacle that he can't come up with his own jokes and was fooled into reading a ridiculous taunt penned by a staffer.  

 

He's the opposite of a Daly in Chicago or Cianci in Providence or Menino in Boston.  

 

 

 

I think you meant to say he hustled and got everything by working hard. 

4 minutes ago, Lazarus said:

^it appears as though Aftab has breezed through life so far

 

Uh, in fairness, if you want an easy breeze through life ...

 

... there are better ways of doing that than being mayor of a large city.

 

If he really wanted that, he'd have stayed in the legal department at Procter & Gamble.

23 minutes ago, ryanlammi said:

 

I think you meant to say he hustled and got everything by working hard. 

 

Therein lies the dilemma.   He's been planning for a career in politics since he was a teenager, meaning he had to organize his entire life around that, to the detriment of doing things (like working crap jobs alongside uncouth characters) that might have enabled him to effectively taunt the Kansas City Chiefs.  

 

You can't pay someone to go to law school and then pass the bar in your name, meaning he's obviously a well-disciplined person in that respect.  But that's why it's all so fake when he makes a show of helping people who are helpless against a system stacked against them - the same system that Aftab so easily conquered.  

 

 

 

 

One or two crap jobs at the wrong time can really derail a young person.

9 minutes ago, GCrites80s said:

One or two crap jobs at the wrong time can really derail a young person.

Yes, but they can recover if they are young. Much better than have 3 crap jobs in your teens and 20s and keep trying than do the same job for 30 years and then lose it unexpectedly.  The person you feel for is the steelworker or autoworker who lost their job in the great recession and had no other marketable skills because they did their job diligently for 25 years. They could barely type an email and had zero computer skills. They are of an age where it is difficult to be retrained to do something viable in the modern economy. These are the workers to feel sorry for, the ones who are in their prime and have the only way of life they understood snatched out from them. The young worker can adapt and should if they are not lazy. 

2 hours ago, 10albersa said:

This is where the issue is for me.  Some people are born into situations where they can try and fail a million times with no real consequences.  Others are born in zip codes that could mean you get a few trials and errors, but they set you back and could ruin you.  It's okay to have a gap, just not one that is as severe as it is today.

The world will always be unfair. There will be those born into much better situations and you have to do your best with the hand you had dealt. That does not mean you should quit trying and merely accept your lot in life. It also means you should not begrudge those who have more than you or may have won the birth lottery. That just makes you bitter and keeps you from realizing your potential.  If you say the deck is stacked against me so why try, then you have already lost. 

That's why I explicitly stated that it's okay to have a gap.  The severity of that gap is the issue.

1 minute ago, 10albersa said:

That's why I explicitly stated that it's okay to have a gap.  The severity of that gap is the issue.

I get that. One thing often spouted by the socialist crowd is how we should be more like Europe. BUt Europe has a much wider gap between the elites (who are fewer but much better off) than in the US. Also, the US system allows for the most upward mobility due to the fact that the US does a good job at promoting innovation. If you look at the millionaires in the US, or if you want to take it to $10 millionaires + the vast majority are first generation. Typically, by the 3rd generation most of the wealth in families is gone.  

There's an entire generation out there right now working their asses off for very little after they spent their youth following the same "advice" that @Brutus_buckeyeand @Lazarus are repeating here. While politicians are always going to be politicians, at least the younger generations seem to be more into empathy rather than buying into false tales of "bootstraps" and "it's morning in America again."

 

Edited March 28, 20232 yr by Gordon Bombay

10 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

I get that. One thing often spouted by the socialist crowd is how we should be more like Europe. BUt Europe has a much wider gap between the elites (who are fewer but much better off) than in the US. Also, the US system allows for the most upward mobility due to the fact that the US does a good job at promoting innovation. If you look at the millionaires in the US, or if you want to take it to $10 millionaires + the vast majority are first generation. Typically, by the 3rd generation most of the wealth in families is gone.  

Literally the first Google search result:

“Today, the top 1% in Europe take 12% of income (in the US, 20%) while the bottom 50% have 22% (in the US, 10%). It's often said that globalisation and digitalisation explain the surge in global inequality, but that's not a very convincing narrative.Jan 24, 2018”

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/24/fairest-europeans-inequality-surged-us-europe

 

 

12 minutes ago, Gordon Bombay said:

There's an entire generation out there right now working their asses off for very little after they spent their youth following the same "advice" that@Brutus_buckeyeand @Lazarusare repeating here. While politicians are always going to be politicians, at least the younger generations seem to be more into empathy rather than buying into false tales of "bootstraps" and "it's morning in America again."

 

What a defeatist and lazy attitude. I know I did not come from an elite background with a silver spoon in my mouth and neither did @Lazarus. I certainly know a number of kids who did, and I do not begrudge them for it. If you do not like your lot in life, you can change it but it does require hard work and sacrifice. Sometimes the cost may not be worth it to some people. It is not buying into Horatio Alger tales and it is not that the younger generation has more "empathy," it is more so that many in the younger generation refuse to do what they need to do in order to better themselves and sit there and complain that life is unfair.  It is not empathy, but more that the Gen z needs to toughen up a bit and realize it is not about them anymore. 

Edited March 28, 20232 yr by Brutus_buckeye

3 minutes ago, Brutus_buckeye said:

it is not that the younger generation has more "empathy," it is more so that many in the younger generation refuse to do what they need to do in order to better themselves and sit there and complain that life is unfair.  It is not empathy, but more that the Gen z needs to toughen up a bit and realize it is not about them anymore. 

And I'm the one with the "lazy" attitude? Telling kids working their asses off to "toughen up," because you perceive their care for others as complaining? You're talking about a generation that continues to face mounting income inequality on top of incredible social upheaval. 

 

Get a grip.

Edited March 28, 20232 yr by Gordon Bombay

1 minute ago, Gordon Bombay said:

And I'm the one with the "lazy" attitude? Telling kids working their asses off to "toughen up," because you perceive their care for others as complaining?

 

Get a grip.

No, they are using that as a scapegoat for their own failure to launch. 

You need to care for others, but you also need to care for yourself. If you cant be a functional adult on your own, you cant help others. This fact is often lost on many in Gen Z

How it started:

 

Cincinnati mayor proposes reducing availability of residential property tax abatements in wealthier neighborhoods/census tracts.

 

How it's going:

 

"Kids these days."

Which is basically UrbanOhio.

Aftab Pureval content only, please - I'm cleaning the thread up a bit. 

Cincinnati Mayor Aftab Pureval tapped for President Joe Biden's reelection campaign advisory board

 

Cincinnati Mayor Aftab Pureval is one of nine mayors that will serve on President Joe Biden's national advisory board, launched Wednesday, May 10, to aid his reelection efforts.

 

Pureval and his fellow board members "will participate in regular media interviews, assist with fundraising efforts and events, leverage their networks and platforms to amplify the campaign’s message to voters and engage directly with voters through grassroots efforts and events in key battleground states," according to a news release.

 

Overall, 50 Democratic Party officials from across the nation will participate on the board, including Ohio Congressional Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-Columbus) and Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Cleveland). The three are Ohio's lone representatives on the board, which is chaired by U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi.

 

More below:

https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2023/05/10/aftab-pureval-joe-biden-advisory-board.html

 

Cincinnati Mayor Pureval proposes pilot guaranteed income program, erasing medical debt for citizens

 

Mayor Aftab Pureval proposed three new pilot social programs as a part of the city’s budget, including one to provide a basic income to a group of residents and another to pay off citizens’ medical debts.

 

The mayor has not yet identified which local organizations the city will partner with or said how people can apply for the grants. City Council also must first approve the programs.

 

Quote

“We have a challenge in this city for racial equity, for access to affordable housing, for wealth generation particularly for people of color. Unfortunately, these specific issues have persisted. I’m proud … this government continues to innovate, continues to lean in to new technologies and new ideas to disrupt cycle of poverty and violence,” Pureval told reporters on May 26.

 

Pureval wants the city to spend $1.5 million reducing or wiping out the medical debt of its citizens, which would address 30,000 residents’ debts. Other local governments, including ones in Chicago, Pittsburgh and New Orleans have similar efforts.

 

More below:

https://www.bizjournals.com/cincinnati/news/2023/05/30/pureval-pilot-guaranteed-income.html

 

This dude is such a pathetic yes-man:

 

https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/politics/2023/09/26/pureval-five-former-cincinnati-mayors-gather-to-support-railroad-sale/70968356007/

I really hope the next mayoral campaign has some good candidates because I am not looking forward to voting for this guy again. 

Given how popular the city administration has been this term, he's also likely popular by association.  And he's charismatic.  He won't have a strong challenger from the Democratic party. They wouldn't want to eat their own, especially one with a "rising star" label on him.

Yeah no one is likely to challenge him in 2025. He's certainly a yes-man for the old money interests in the city. The administration is making progress in a lot of areas regarding pedestrian safety, but I'll never be satisfied with the progress. They could be doing a lot more, obviously. But at least the administration isn't anti-urban.

20 hours ago, 10albersa said:

Given how popular the city administration has been this term, he's also likely popular by association.  And he's charismatic.  He won't have a strong challenger from the Democratic party. They wouldn't want to eat their own, especially one with a "rising star" label on him.

So who is the token opposition against him? Keating?

Smitherman again maybe? Keating would lose if she runs as an R against a popular incumbent.  It would have to be a democrat or independent that tacks dead center.