The 40-year con by wealthy developers, fossil fuel companies & morbidly rich billionaires, who’d rather shoot up into outer space than pay their taxes, has to end or more people will die
The condo collapse was due to the local building department approving a flawed design that was going to fail and it was only a matter of time, and the obvious fact that the same building department did not inspect the construction work or chose to look the other way when no waterproofing was applied to the foundation area over the parking garage. The reason for having local building departments is to keep developers and their contractors honest and when it fails to do its job people die. They die in building collapses and dams breaking and 737 airplanes crashing to the ground. Problem in part is that the people making the decisions are never held accountable for their actions. No one at Boeing was tried for manslaughter and only the shareholders paid for the deaths that were caused.
The condo owners were informed of the problems years ago. They ignored the warnings until too late. While building codes are critical, they do not substitute for conscientious builders or owners.
And once again, as long as money equals speech and corporations are people, corrupt and incompetent public sector decision-making will kill more people.
Fighting a local fossil fuel project has taught me exactly what happens locally with permits. The first priority stated in every statute or ordinance will state the mission is public safety. But, what happens when big bucks are involved is decision-makers shift safety to the project owners. They don't due their duty and oversight is out the window. Right-wing logic is that it is not in an owners' self-interest to f-up what they are building. This is EXACTLY the stupid position Greenspan et al took on the banks and home loans. Well duh, we all saw how that worked out. Fossil fuel projects promise communities the sun, moon and stars, but deliver dirty air and polluted water while abusing landowners and stakeholders.
On C-Span at a congressional hearing around 2005, the big execs from the oil and car companies literally admitted to colluding about CAFE standards and the kind of cars they decide to build. Of course they acted like it was working together in the interest of the consumer and their demands. Yea, right! We bailed these bastards out and subsidized them. We deserve a Green New Deal and the jobs it will create after what they have done to us. They can get onboard or they can get the hell out of the energy business and car manufacturing. No more enabling the money addicts and poisoners in the name of jobs!
There are many, many statistical charts describing every aspect of the American economy, wealth, and welfare, which take a stark break right about 1980. One of the most important is the break between labor productivity and labor return on product (wages), where productivity continued its consistent upward trajectory while wages began to stagnate and have never really increased. So many of the problems facing our country can be explained by that one separation. And it all started about 1980.
The economics of democracy have no, zero, nada provisions for monopolies, pyramids and the circular transfers of wealth. This is exactly why the realestate community created what we today call; an independent concept. A way for the realestate community to transfer money from the purchaser of a condo unit to "themselves", the "builders and developers" circumventing the easily understood building regulations governed by common practices. But most important circumventing, the proper dollar (wealth) transfers required in a democracy for that local community. A democracy requires for, "wealth creation", to happen, including the cost paid for the expenditure; the labor, materials, builders and developers and financing costs and profits that were paid in present dollars. Those costs are to include what the local community in present and future dollars requires for maintaining and growing the local community so it does not die like so many of are small towns today in America. Democracy must ensure that the "perpetuation of title"; For most Americans the equity in their home (Title), is the only true and lasting wealth they can achieve and will achieve in their lifetime. The creation of this "Independent concept", seemed to create a seemless transfer of this; ("title" of this singular condo units value) its "purchase price" and it's growth in projected future dollar value measured in the wealth of the "total condo unit structure" plus that "singular condos units future value". A so-called "realestate value". It is dificult enough to predict the value of a single stick built home in a relationship to some future time let alone a complex of homes of a12 or 20 stories condo unit. (Realestate value is what a knowledgeable byer and a knowledgeable seller agree as a reasonable price). Predicting what that condo complex' value is to be in its local community. (A single units present dollar value) is then assigned a relationship to a particular moment in time; (in the life span, of the "condo complex". But only as long as the complex remains a valued part of the local community). For that to happen the people of that community must pay for the infrastructure of new and continued growth. A amount of those costs must have or at least, should have been assigned to those profits that were created in the original construction of those condos. For wealth to be created in a democracy a "independent concept" robs the very "creation of wealth" from that local community, from democracy .Independent concept assigns profits to a small few. Like in a time share. the wealth that is created is shared only by the time share company. They do not buy you out when you no longer wish to use the time share for the price they want for a new unit in the same complex. They charge you for the infrastructure costs of new roofs new pools, road widing and repairs. They have no means of paying for any of these costs let alone a desire to pay a share.
The condo collapse was due to the local building department approving a flawed design that was going to fail and it was only a matter of time, and the obvious fact that the same building department did not inspect the construction work or chose to look the other way when no waterproofing was applied to the foundation area over the parking garage. The reason for having local building departments is to keep developers and their contractors honest and when it fails to do its job people die. They die in building collapses and dams breaking and 737 airplanes crashing to the ground. Problem in part is that the people making the decisions are never held accountable for their actions. No one at Boeing was tried for manslaughter and only the shareholders paid for the deaths that were caused.
Amen, Bruce. We rarely hold rich people to account in the same ways we do average or poor people...and that needs to change.
The condo owners were informed of the problems years ago. They ignored the warnings until too late. While building codes are critical, they do not substitute for conscientious builders or owners.
And once again, as long as money equals speech and corporations are people, corrupt and incompetent public sector decision-making will kill more people.
Fighting a local fossil fuel project has taught me exactly what happens locally with permits. The first priority stated in every statute or ordinance will state the mission is public safety. But, what happens when big bucks are involved is decision-makers shift safety to the project owners. They don't due their duty and oversight is out the window. Right-wing logic is that it is not in an owners' self-interest to f-up what they are building. This is EXACTLY the stupid position Greenspan et al took on the banks and home loans. Well duh, we all saw how that worked out. Fossil fuel projects promise communities the sun, moon and stars, but deliver dirty air and polluted water while abusing landowners and stakeholders.
On C-Span at a congressional hearing around 2005, the big execs from the oil and car companies literally admitted to colluding about CAFE standards and the kind of cars they decide to build. Of course they acted like it was working together in the interest of the consumer and their demands. Yea, right! We bailed these bastards out and subsidized them. We deserve a Green New Deal and the jobs it will create after what they have done to us. They can get onboard or they can get the hell out of the energy business and car manufacturing. No more enabling the money addicts and poisoners in the name of jobs!
There are many, many statistical charts describing every aspect of the American economy, wealth, and welfare, which take a stark break right about 1980. One of the most important is the break between labor productivity and labor return on product (wages), where productivity continued its consistent upward trajectory while wages began to stagnate and have never really increased. So many of the problems facing our country can be explained by that one separation. And it all started about 1980.
The economics of democracy have no, zero, nada provisions for monopolies, pyramids and the circular transfers of wealth. This is exactly why the realestate community created what we today call; an independent concept. A way for the realestate community to transfer money from the purchaser of a condo unit to "themselves", the "builders and developers" circumventing the easily understood building regulations governed by common practices. But most important circumventing, the proper dollar (wealth) transfers required in a democracy for that local community. A democracy requires for, "wealth creation", to happen, including the cost paid for the expenditure; the labor, materials, builders and developers and financing costs and profits that were paid in present dollars. Those costs are to include what the local community in present and future dollars requires for maintaining and growing the local community so it does not die like so many of are small towns today in America. Democracy must ensure that the "perpetuation of title"; For most Americans the equity in their home (Title), is the only true and lasting wealth they can achieve and will achieve in their lifetime. The creation of this "Independent concept", seemed to create a seemless transfer of this; ("title" of this singular condo units value) its "purchase price" and it's growth in projected future dollar value measured in the wealth of the "total condo unit structure" plus that "singular condos units future value". A so-called "realestate value". It is dificult enough to predict the value of a single stick built home in a relationship to some future time let alone a complex of homes of a12 or 20 stories condo unit. (Realestate value is what a knowledgeable byer and a knowledgeable seller agree as a reasonable price). Predicting what that condo complex' value is to be in its local community. (A single units present dollar value) is then assigned a relationship to a particular moment in time; (in the life span, of the "condo complex". But only as long as the complex remains a valued part of the local community). For that to happen the people of that community must pay for the infrastructure of new and continued growth. A amount of those costs must have or at least, should have been assigned to those profits that were created in the original construction of those condos. For wealth to be created in a democracy a "independent concept" robs the very "creation of wealth" from that local community, from democracy .Independent concept assigns profits to a small few. Like in a time share. the wealth that is created is shared only by the time share company. They do not buy you out when you no longer wish to use the time share for the price they want for a new unit in the same complex. They charge you for the infrastructure costs of new roofs new pools, road widing and repairs. They have no means of paying for any of these costs let alone a desire to pay a share.