Oregon Sends A Game-Changing Progressive Message on Taxes

[Teebs]

Simple geometry. As a population grows and a city expands, the area said city occupies and thus the number of police needed to patrol it efficiently increases exponentially. Same with roads, electrical grid maintenance, and waste disposal , which are a function of area and not population. Schools have limited service areas and thus deal with that same issue as well.

The same issue exists with ant foraging (Just applying the same principles from what I know of social insect colony infrastructure to human developments, because they are governed by the same rules). As a colony grows in number the amount of area it covers to forage, and thus the area it must cover in order to patrol that foraging area and defend it against rival colonies increases exponentially with colony size. The size of the nest itself increases in volume the same way, etc.

I don't follow why this is the case. Doesn't it rely on falling population density which doesn't make intuitive sense to me. I don't see a reason why the area occupied by a population increases faster than that population. If you're putting 500 people in one square kilometre of land, adding another 500 people gives only one more square kilometre. I realise this is making assumptions about the effects of population growth on population density, but I don't see why they're any less plausible than yours.

Edit: I suppose zoning laws might have an effect, in the UK we tend to have quite strict laws about where you can build which might not be as strong as in the US and these would presumably encourage denser expansion.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I don't follow why this is the case. Doesn't it rely on falling population density which doesn't make intuitive sense to me. I don't see a reason why the area occupied by a population increases faster than that population. If you're putting 500 people in one square kilometre of land, adding another 500 people gives only one more square kilometre. I realise this is making assumptions about the effects of population growth on population density, but I don't see why they're any less plausible than yours.

You canceled out the exponent in your mental math.

When you define persons/sq km you create an SI unit, which increases linearly. People increase (in terms of city growth anyway) linearly. However the space they occupy is a 2 dimensional space, and as a result increases by the square. As a result of this the Services:Marginal increase in people ratio is high, because city services have to expand into a new geographic area, rather than just being attached to that person.

[Darth Holbytlan]

Alyrium,

What you are saying here makes no sense. A city's population density generally rises with its population. In other words, its area grows less quickly than the population; certainly not exponentially, or even geometrically.

See here for a list of cities listed by population density. Notice that the densest cities are also generally the largest, which directly contradicts what you are claiming, here.

[Darth Wong]

Simple geometry. As a population grows and a city expands, the area said city occupies and thus the number of police needed to patrol it efficiently increases exponentially. Same with roads, electrical grid maintenance, and waste disposal , which are a function of area and not population. Schools have limited service areas and thus deal with that same issue as well.

I'm going to add my voice to the chorus of people saying that this makes no sense, Aly. Cities are more dense than rural areas and the cost to deliver services such as police, hospital, and electricity is actually lower per capita in cities than it is in less dense areas.

Your argument is based on the bizarre notion that as cities grow, their population density actually decreases, hence the city area expands faster than the population does. I would very much like to see some kind of empirical data to support this claim, since it flies in the face of everything I've seen.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Simple geometry. As a population grows and a city expands, the area said city occupies and thus the number of police needed to patrol it efficiently increases exponentially. Same with roads, electrical grid maintenance, and waste disposal , which are a function of area and not population. Schools have limited service areas and thus deal with that same issue as well.

I'm going to add my voice to the chorus of people saying that this makes no sense, Aly. Cities are more dense than rural areas and the cost to deliver services such as police, hospital, and electricity is actually lower per capita in cities than it is in less dense areas.

Your argument is based on the bizarre notion that as cities grow, their population density actually decreases, hence the city area expands faster than the population does. I would very much like to see some kind of empirical data to support this claim, since it flies in the face of everything I've seen.

In an inner city that would be the case, but in suburbia (where most of the commuting population lives) the population density does decrease the father one moves out from city center.

On the other hand, now that I think it over again, you may be right. I took an extra step in my head. Area is a square function, but given an SI unit (persons/square KM) it would increase linearly with population size assuming constant density.

However, wouldnt costs for necessary services which cover a geographic area (assuming constant density) increase faster than population size? As area increases, efficiency in delivery decreases. Or am I trying to make too big an analogy between human cities and ant colony foraging trails?

In the case of an ant colony, the area that is required to support a given colony becomes massive, and efficiency in foraging decreases, in terms of the percent of ants that must do the foraging, due to the area they must cover. I assumed human infrastructure would be analogous. Water delivery, police patrols, stuff like that. As the physical area increases, the percentage of the population (or resources) that must be devoted to that would increase.

I suppose that could be obviated with decentralization to a degree.

Conceded pending clarification of my error.

[Darth Wong]

In an inner city that would be the case, but in suburbia (where most of the commuting population lives) the population density does decrease the father one moves out from city center.

That doesn't mean the aggregate population density of the city as a whole decreases as it grows. Obviously, the outlying areas of any given city will be less dense than the core, at any given size. But that doesn't mean that a growing city will experience a constant decrease in overall population density, especially not such a rapid one that you could call it an exponential effect.

On the other hand, now that I think it over again, you may be right. I took an extra step in my head. Area is a square function, but given an SI unit (persons/square KM) it would increase linearly with population size assuming constant density.

Precisely.

However, wouldnt costs for necessary services which cover a geographic area (assuming constant density) increase faster than population size? As area increases, efficiency in delivery decreases. Or am I trying to make too big an analogy between human cities and ant colony foraging trails?

No. We are not ants. As cities grow, we tend to build more and more condominiums to compensate for increasing property costs, and condominiums represent an enormous increase in population density, packing hundreds of people into a land area which would have originally supported a handful of families.

In the case of an ant colony, the area that is required to support a given colony becomes massive, and efficiency in foraging decreases, in terms of the percent of ants that must do the foraging, due to the area they must cover. I assumed human infrastructure would be analogous. Water delivery, police patrols, stuff like that. As the physical area increases, the percentage of the population (or resources) that must be devoted to that would increase.

I suppose that could be obviated with decentralization to a degree.

Ants have the same living space requirements regardless of the size of their colony (they do not have techniques for greatly increasing their population density as we do), and they do not have mechanized travel, so they must move slowly to cover a larger foraging area. Hence, as foraging area grows, the centralized nature of it and their lack of sophisticated logistical techniques such as intermediate staging areas and depots mean that they spend most of their time walking.

You really need to get over this habit of assuming you can take lessons from the animal world and apply them to industrialized human society without modification.

[Themightytom]

Interesting, Obama is in town Tuesday visiting a school that has been making local headlines because the senior business class presented to the school board some ideas for addressing deficits in the school budget that will result in SERIOUS cutbacks. The schoolboard shot them all down of course, because they are pragmatic, and we live in NH so raising taxes will get you shot around here.. but still I wonder if he will comment on it.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Wish we could do something like this in California, but a few decades ago they passed some laws limiting how much you could raise taxes in any given year.

[Questor]

Wish we could do something like this in California, but a few decades ago they passed some laws limiting how much you could raise taxes in any given year.

Actually, there are a number of people trying to get prop 18 killed. But the best thing you can work on right now is helping the various coalitions get the local tax approval number moved to simple majority.