total_life_forever

total_life_forever t1_jbtsf0s wrote

Your take is missing the corresponding, accompanying fact that, countrywide, corporations and billionaires should be properly taxed to address precisely this kind of situation.

It's really a glaring thing to omit. We know what the solution should be, it's just unpopular amongst political donors.

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total_life_forever t1_jbtrzwz wrote

The unavoidable problem is that any large business is going to want tax breaks and other perks that really make their coming here not a big coup for state and local governments. The hypermobility of capital has created a race to the bottom in this regard - the only way to compete with other locales for "job creation" is to give up damn near every benefit in favor of wooing the corporation. At that point you're pinning all your hopes on trickle down economics (good jobs will be created, and they'll have higher wages!) but even that is misleading because corporations routinely depress wages and conduct mass layoffs. RI doesn't have good jobs, and barring a wave of change addressing the inherent flaws in capitalism, it's mostly going to stay that way.

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total_life_forever t1_j9r0uop wrote

the university has room for 50 more students in their dorms now.

(I know that's simplifying things a bit, but if more student housing is built off campus, who's to say the university doesn't just admit more students and continue to allow off-campus landlords to subsidize their housing issues.)

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total_life_forever t1_is1sx9d wrote

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total_life_forever t1_is1rhz1 wrote

Taking something people desperately need to survive and making it unaffordable because of profit motive is capitalism. It is a decision made in the furtherance of capital to the detriment of social need.

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total_life_forever t1_is11x2c wrote

Many of those people cannot get the care they need because healthcare is inaccessible because it is commodified because of capitalism.

Additionally, the number of homeless folks is going to increase this season with the cost of heat/utilities going up because of political/lobbying efforts of moneyed interest (again, capitalism). People will become homeless because they cannot afford the increased rate because they work for employers who are incentivized, and enabled, to depress the employees' wages (again, capitalism).

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