Pet taxes

[Enigma]

There's already a pet tax in some areas that I know of. What do you call paying for those collar tags for cats and dogs?

[Alyeska]

This must be some kind of joke. You live in what, Missoula? You call Missoula a city? There are literally two score towns that size surrounding SF. We call them "suburbs." As in suburban. Not in the city proper.

I just looked up the relative population density - Missoula has just shy of three thousand people per square mile, SF has SEVENTEEN thousand per square mile.

The idea that the problems confronted by what would be a bedroom community here are even in the same category as those faced by an actual urban environment is laughable on its face.

I live in a city. That my city isn't the same size as your city does not change this fact. Not every city has the same concern. So I contest PeZook's arguments and its merits.

[Bluewolf]

I assume that collar tag payments are an incentive to stop pets getting lost or stolen Enigma?

PS: Oh, and this thread, at the rate it's going will probably need to be renamed but I am sure the mods are ready to do that.

[Serafina]

I have no details right now, but there was a project in Munich some years ago which was concerned with lowering the numbers of dogs - because there were too many dogs in our parks, severely limiting their utility for other people!
While i wasn't living in Munich at that time, there were severe problems caused by this. Free-roaming dogs make quite a bit of space unusable for just sitting down and enjoying the park and dog-shit can really clutter up a park. Plus, some of our parks are used for riding or have other free-roaming animals (mostly birds, but also squirrels or such - and in one case sheep) which can cause obvious problems with dogs.

Ideas considered ranged from outright bans of dogs and similar pets in certain areas or parks over a duty to keep dogs at their leash in such areas to, yes, higher dog taxes. I think the leash duty was implemented for plenty of parks, along with a higher dog tax which apparently managed to reduce the number of dogs. You still have plenty of possibilities to take your dog outside, but our parks are now much more usable.

And Munich is actually a pretty green city with plenty of large public parks. Such problems would only be worse in cities where that is not the case.

[Enigma]

I assume that collar tag payments are an incentive to stop pets getting lost or stolen Enigma?

PS: Oh, and this thread, at the rate it's going will probably need to be renamed but I am sure the mods are ready to do that.

Then why pay every year instead of paying when there is a change of address and so forth? If you have a dog it st spends it's life in one house, why pay every year for a tag that says the same thing?

As for the topic at hand, I'd prefer a phasing out of plastic bags and an intense marketing campaign to encourage use of re-usable bags. For those that prefer to stick to regular plastic bags until it is gone, charge the customer a 0.25 cent fee per bag and have the money collected be donated to some environmental organizations or some other charity.

[Thanas]

The city should work to support the pets, not the other way around. Its the failing of the city to not adapt to the demands of the people who live in it. The government shouldn't be attempting to punish pet owners. Attempting to force the numbers to reduce is a deliberate attempt at negative reinforcement. Punishment. Taxes for improved pet facilities is good. Taxes for the sake of getting rid of pets is bad. The city is punishing people for failing to address their needs.

That is a really bad argument. First, the city should work to support its citizens, not the pet owners only. Second, if the pets impact the quality of life of more people than they do enhance it, then why should the city support something that is detrimental to the majority of its citizens?

What kind of fucking rabbit hutch hive world nightmares do you people live in where you can't have space for a dog? Don't start with the backpeddling now, the original statement was clearly "punative to discourage and eliminate". Well, I'd like a punative penalty to discourage all the disgusting fatties I see who are also giant liabilities to our health care system, that's a far far greater and more readily demonstrable societal harm than stepping in dog poop.

Yes, because clearly dogs are paying taxes, vote....idiot.

[Thanas]

Thread split.

I also am very disappointed that many people, including one moderator and one supermoderator, cannot stay on topic. Good going there, people.

[Alyeska]

That is a really bad argument. First, the city should work to support its citizens, not the pet owners only. Second, if the pets impact the quality of life of more people than they do enhance it, then why should the city support something that is detrimental to the majority of its citizens?

The city should work to support its citizens. It shouldn't say "whelp, helping pet owners is hard, tough shit".

[Thanas]

That is a really bad argument. First, the city should work to support its citizens, not the pet owners only. Second, if the pets impact the quality of life of more people than they do enhance it, then why should the city support something that is detrimental to the majority of its citizens?

The city should work to support its citizens. It shouldn't say "whelp, helping pet owners is hard, tough shit".

This is just another buzzword answer, really. Do you disagree that pet owners should bear a larger burden via a fine because their pets are inflicting disproportionate damage to the city?

[Simon_Jester]

I'm more or less with Thanas on this one; owning pets is not something essential to a person's life, and you don't suffer any injury from not owning pets*. So if the general public, and public servants, are incurring a cost because of pet owners, it is not unfair to charge the pet owners specifically.

If you could make a case like "I would die without my cat!" then you could make a case for state-subsidized pet ownership, in which the costs would be borne out of general tax revenues. But people don't die, and aren't seriously harmed, for lack of cats, no matter how much they love cats. So I think it's fair to cover the costs to the government by a consumption tax paid by the people responsible for the service being necessary.

*With a few exceptions like seeing-eye dogs, which you might well make tax-exempt on general principles.

[Alyeska]

That is a really bad argument. First, the city should work to support its citizens, not the pet owners only. Second, if the pets impact the quality of life of more people than they do enhance it, then why should the city support something that is detrimental to the majority of its citizens?

The city should work to support its citizens. It shouldn't say "whelp, helping pet owners is hard, tough shit".

This is just another buzzword answer, really. Do you disagree that pet owners should bear a larger burden via a fine because their pets are inflicting disproportionate damage to the city?

Thats what pet licensing is for. I never said I disagree with pet owners paying fees. I said I disagree with deliberate negative taxation because I don't think pets are over running cities and need to be reduced. There might be selective problems in some areas, but pets and dogs are not a massive nuisance that need to be rid of as argued by some.

[Terralthra]

It's rather embarrassing, I would think, for a board moderator to remove paragraphs from a post to which they specifically replied, then continued arguing as if that paragraph was never written.

[Thanas]

Thats what pet licensing is for. I never said I disagree with pet owners paying fees. I said I disagree with deliberate negative taxation because I don't think pets are over running cities and need to be reduced.

You might want to take into account that this very well happens somewhere else, say, in Poland?

There might be selective problems in some areas, but pets and dogs are not a massive nuisance that need to be rid of as argued by some.

Yes, I just love how you tell me there are no such problems in the cities I lived in. Clearly, that never happened at all. I was just imagining it.

Really, taxation is a very valid element of social control, especially when it is used to prevent negative occurrences from happening. Please do note that this is not because the evil Polish/German city council hates dogs, but because there are too damned many of them.

[PeZook]

Thats what pet licensing is for. I never said I disagree with pet owners paying fees. I said I disagree with deliberate negative taxation because I don't think pets are over running cities and need to be reduced. There might be selective problems in some areas, but pets and dogs are not a massive nuisance that need to be rid of as argued by some.

I can see how my original post was too general and could give an impression that I advocated instituting a general, high and punitive pet tax in every single city.

I concede this would be stupid and unnecessary, because obviously not all cities are alike. The tax, if implemented, should obviously be set by the city council or its equivalent, not the federal government.

However, as you yourself noted, this may be (and is) a problem in some areas, and if the authorities there determine that solving it via other means is not feasible, then rising pet taxes to discourage ownership is entirely viable and not morally wrong at all, at least not more than using punitive fees and taxes to discourage parking in city centers, or charging people for bringing a vehicle into historic sites.

My original statement was meant in the context of colleting dog poop: that if alternatives to plastic bags would not be able to deal with the problem, you could work to reduce the number of pets with other means...like taxes. That's obviously a rather far-fetched scenario,since there is no reason why using waxed paper or little carton boxes or hell compostable plastics wouldn't work just as well as plastic bags.

[Alyeska]

You might want to take into account that this very well happens somewhere else, say, in Poland?

That would fall under "selective problems in some areas".

Yes, I just love how you tell me there are no such problems in the cities I lived in. Clearly, that never happened at all. I was just imagining it.

Quote me saying you don't have problems in your cities. I never once said that. I was arguing against the statement that all pets must be punished in all cities. That was the original implication given.

Really, taxation is a very valid element of social control, especially when it is used to prevent negative occurrences from happening. Please do note that this is not because the evil Polish/German city council hates dogs, but because there are too damned many of them.

If that is the case, then I do not disagree with the system as setup in those areas. But if it turns out the taxation is merely an easy way out and the city never attempted to build the resources to support the pets, I disagree 100% with the intent of the tax.

[Alyeska]

Thats what pet licensing is for. I never said I disagree with pet owners paying fees. I said I disagree with deliberate negative taxation because I don't think pets are over running cities and need to be reduced. There might be selective problems in some areas, but pets and dogs are not a massive nuisance that need to be rid of as argued by some.

I can see how my original post was too general and could give an impression that I advocated instituting a general, high and punitive pet tax in every single city.

I concede this would be stupid and unnecessary, because obviously not all cities are alike. The tax, if implemented, should obviously be set by the city council or its equivalent, not the federal government.

However, as you yourself noted, this may be (and is) a problem in some areas, and if the authorities there determine that solving it via other means is not feasible, then rising pet taxes to discourage ownership is entirely viable and not morally wrong at all, at least not more than using punitive fees and taxes to discourage parking in city centers, or charging people for bringing a vehicle into historic sites.

My original statement was meant in the context of colleting dog poop: that if alternatives to plastic bags would not be able to deal with the problem, you could work to reduce the number of pets with other means...like taxes. That's obviously a rather far-fetched scenario,since there is no reason why using waxed paper or little carton boxes or hell compostable plastics wouldn't work just as well as plastic bags.

Fair enough. I quite agree with that sentiment.

[Sea Skimmer]

What I'd really like to see is a scanner that can scan through a bag and pick up all the items in it. So I go to the store, fill my reusable bags, throw them on the conveyor, it scans them en masse, I pay the cashier. That would absolutely get the "Fuck it, convenience" on board.

That's being worked on by placing RFID tags on every single item in the grocery stores; which does create problems with vegetable selection but not terminal ones. I believe a couple stores already exist in the world which operate like this on a trial basis.

[ArmorPierce]

So you guys telling me that y ou don't reuse the grocery bag as a trash bag? Every single trash can in my house uses a grocery bag.

[Thanas]

NOTE: This is the wrong thread to talk about plastic bags.

[Akhlut]

I'm more or less with Thanas on this one; owning pets is not something essential to a person's life, and you don't suffer any injury from not owning pets*. So if the general public, and public servants, are incurring a cost because of pet owners, it is not unfair to charge the pet owners specifically.

If you could make a case like "I would die without my cat!" then you could make a case for state-subsidized pet ownership, in which the costs would be borne out of general tax revenues. But people don't die, and aren't seriously harmed, for lack of cats, no matter how much they love cats. So I think it's fair to cover the costs to the government by a consumption tax paid by the people responsible for the service being necessary.

*With a few exceptions like seeing-eye dogs, which you might well make tax-exempt on general principles.

Pet ownership seems to have a decent effect on health: http://newsinhealth.nih.gov/2009/February/feature1.htm

"Some of the largest and most well-designed studies in this field suggest that four-legged friends can help to improve our cardiovascular health. One NIH-funded study looked at 421 adults who’d suffered heart attacks. A year later, the scientists found, dog owners were significantly more likely to still be alive than were those who did not own dogs, regardless of the severity of the heart attack. "


So, given the health benefits which would potentially lower expenses due to hospitalization and time lost from work, what say you now?

While I am not opposed to a pet taxes on principle, I do not think they should be prohibitive (especially if the animal is spayed/neutered and microchipped). About the only time I think they should be prohibitive is for animals capable of breeding, so as to discourage the explosive population growth that dogs and cats (the primary pets that would really be taxed in that manner) can experience in a city, as feral animals are a much larger problem than pets, in terms of disease, filth, and danger to humans.