http://www.gothamist.com/2007/04/20/bloombergs_guid.php All comments for Bloomberg's Guide For Political Donations en-us 2007 jen Tue, 05 Jun 2007 18:08:15 -0500 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss jen@gothamist.com jen@gothamist.com 60 http://www.gothamist.com/2007/04/20/bloombergs_guid.php#comment-1071252 http://www.gothamist.com/2007/04/20/bloombergs_guid.php#comment-1071252 Comments Fri, 20 Apr 2007 10:41:28 -0500 <p>Does anyone know how these tax numbers are calculated? And how the spending numbers are calculated? Is it simply a matter of adding up tax returns and where money is sent? For example, it would seem to me that any money spent on port security in Newark has a direct benefit for New York. Does anyone bother to estimate the benefit or do they go strictly by where the checks are sent? Money spent on the CDC in Atlanta or the NIH in Maryland are spent on behalf of all Americans. What about military spending? There are no bases in New York City but that money ($500 billion or so) is spent on behalf of everyone. Surely Wall Street benefits from money spent on economic infrastructure like roads and bridges in places far away from the city. If there was not a free movement of goods and capital would it be so easy to make bilions sitting at a desk in New York. How about money spent on upstate prisons hold New York City prisoners. How about the reservoirs? Does any money spent upstate for New York City's drinking water count as spending for the city or spending in the actual place where work was done? On the revenue side, let's say I own a few shares of ExxonMobil and receive a dividend. None of the economic activity to create that divided took place in New York but I pay taxes on it from here. Would you really call that New York income? If I move across the river to New Jersey do my taxes suddenly become New Jersey taxes? Anyway, it seems like a meaningless statistic anyway. The whole idea of taxes and government spending is to redistibute money for the greater good. If a certain political party constantly talks about income inequality it is only logical that the rich in New York pay more than they get back. If every locale got back exactly what it put in then there would be no need for a federal government.</p> http://www.gothamist.com/2007/04/20/bloombergs_guid.php#comment-1071231 http://www.gothamist.com/2007/04/20/bloombergs_guid.php#comment-1071231 Comments Fri, 20 Apr 2007 10:21:38 -0500 <p>jus when bloomy finally does something good, like the attempted sting operation in w.virginia, he's gotta do something that makes me scream! </p>