Quote:
Originally Posted by burn_this_city
The newer communties aren't temporary, they will pay for themselves over time, much like the older communities have. Maintenance and inflation costs are irrelevant, they would have been a similar drag on the city whether it was 50 years ago or today.
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How the heck are maintenance and inflation irrelevant? If a new community costs more to maintain than it pays in tax, it will never pay for itself over time. Inflation is hugely relevant because the sum of a geometric series can be finite (like inflation ajusted payback). Combine the two and it's entirely possible that at current subsidy level new communities will never pay themselves off. (In fact, if the city's done their analysis correctly, that's what the "1 billion dollars" figure reflects: the infinite sum of [ongoing costs minus revenues generated adjusted for inflation] (this sum contains infinite elements, but is itself finite) minus the inital subsidy.
Older communities, on the other hand, have more than paid themselves off, and are now paying for the new communities. So the idea that there's an equivalency between Inglewood 100 years ago and Cranston today are somehow equivalent is flat out wrong.