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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Michael M who wrote (66395)	12/13/1999 12:34:00 PM
From: Lizzie Tudor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Lizzie, if a neighborhood is made up of mostly old folks, there isn't much need for school funding there. It's a math thing. Why should these folks be taxed out of their homes because the Beemer generation doesn't want to pay to educate their own kids? OK...how about this. First we have a town called Belmont with a few thousand people and houses in it. The year is 1979. The average age homeowner is 30 and the average home costs $60K. In 1979, a small company called Oracle opens up shop with 20 employees on Davis street. That same year, a property tax bill is passed that freezes everybody's taxes at the 1979 rates... nobody thinks much of this. Time passes... Oracle grows to 12,000 employees and generates a boatload of software startups (which of course NEED to be in the same geographic area because thats where the talent pool is) - and back in the town of Belmont, maybe 10% of those original owners have sold their property, since they have a sweet deal paying only $300. property tax. A large number of these original owners do end up leaving the area, but they decide to RENT the property vs. sell, because they can see the Oracle building out the window and the town is completely land locked. These renters have kids and are paying dearly to live in Belmont but the cash just goes to the owners and nothing to the services that the town provides including the schools. BTW if you don't know anybody that has ever complained about this inequity and the sorry state of Ca schools thanks to one generation that didn't want to pay their fair share, then I guess you don't know anybody under 40.

To: Michael M who wrote (66395)	12/14/1999 1:59:00 AM
From: Grainne	Respond to of 108807

<<Lizzie, if a neighborhood is made up of mostly old folks, there isn't much need for school funding there. It's a math thing. Why should these folks be taxed out of their homes because the Beemer generation doesn't want to pay to educate their own kids?>> Societies as a whole, to ensure stability and productivity, have an enormous stake in creating healthy, well-educated workers. It is yet another symptom of the great pathology of America that we have a generation of older people who hold most of the wealth in this society but cannot understand this basic fact. And kudos to the less selfish among them who do help out in our underfunded schools, and otherwise support education as a worthwhile goal of civilization.