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Derek Young (no, the other one) vs. Tim Eyman
Derek Young vs. Tim Eyman
posted Jul 14, 2009
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FUN FACT: In 2008 Forbes magazine rated Washington the Second Best state for business.
FUN FACT: US News & World Report ranks Washington as the BEST place to start a business.
Just as Noam Chomsky wrote in his seminal essay The Responsibility of Intellectuals, which urges free-thinkers to speak the truth and expose lies, Tim Eyman's boisterous marketing hype (supported by pseudo-scientific evidence) for I-1033 a call to action to reasonable people across Washington state (Palin's REAL AMERICA portions not included).
One such champion of reason or candle in the dark was Gig Harbor City Councilperson and professional Web designer (and in no way Exit133.com blogger) Derek Young, through divine providence and extreme cowardice on behalf of Tim Eyman, who avoided every chance to debate Derek Young in person, came to debate Mr. Eyman from within the confines of an online newspaper article comment thread included below for your convenience and delight:
DerekYoung:
1033 forces all taxes to be voted on by the public. The impact of this is that it would be impossible to bond on anticipated revenues or prepare a multi-year projection. It's an irresponsible local government that does not forecast it's future revenues to see how it will or will not meet demands on its services and infrastructure. 1033 would make that impossible.Reductions in service for police, planning and engineering would be severe. There would be times that you could call for a police officer and none would be available.This initiative is being sold as a modest limit to growth in government. It's not. In fact, I-1033 is a radical proposal that would remake state and local government in ways nobody living has ever seen....Local control is a fundamental principle of American government. I would think that as a conservative you would favor that over centralized government. Why should I care what you decide to pay in taxes in your town and vice versa.Regardless, I'm not talking about tax rates. You do understand the difference between tax rates and tax receipts right? State and local government don't have to touch the sales tax for their collections to go up or down. Particularly for local government this is a rather bizarre idea since your initiative pretends that new economic activity is served for free. Is it often that you expand your watch business without buying more watches? Of course not.1033 would direct revenue from economic development to property taxes until they were completely eliminated. What does that mean? Chaos. How could we afford the roads or police needed for these new or growing businesses?This is not about controlling growth in government. You're trying to push through a radical tax cut disguised as a responsible initiative like 601.We haven't passed a new tax in I don't know how long. At least 20 years. This initiative would dramatically cut taxes, not the other way around. If you want bad roads, more crime, and no parks... feel free to do so in Mukilteo. Leave my town to make its own decisions.
Eyman: "so restraint on the growth of government with inflation plus population growth is 'responsible' if done at the state level, but 'radical' if done at the city or county level? good luck with that."
DerekYoung:
Yes. That's because a city can grow far faster than population and inflation. In the last few years my city has doubled in revenue and expenses but only increased population by a fraction of that. Because the state is much larger that disparity is rarely all that large.Basically you're proposing we bankrupt cities whose business districts grow faster than its population. Conservatives should be horrified at the notion that we should actually punish cities who foster a healthy business climate.
Eyman: "why are you against the voters having a chance to vote on I-1033?"
DerekYoung: I'm not. I'm simply pointing out the flaws in your initiative.
Comments [15]
 by Erik on 7/15/2009 @ 12:06am | The Tacomic is never late!!!1! |
by Erik on 7/15/2009 @ 11:17am | Here is the Derek Young that I think you are referencing.
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 by Dave_L on 7/15/2009 @ 12:29pm | I think it was when this Derek Young posted on the late great Grit City Blog that it caused some momentary confusion and humor. It's like when there were two Captain Kirks. O.K., not really, but it still reminded me of that. This Tacomic is sure to sell. |
 by NineInchNachos on 7/15/2009 @ 1:34pm | the scary part is both Derek Youngs have the exact same hair do at all times. |
 by Crenshaw Sepulveda on 7/15/2009 @ 3:36pm | So we now know who the "evil" Derek is? |
 by on 7/15/2009 @ 3:53pm | I would be the evil Derek giving that nice guy at Exit 133 a bad name. Callaghan at the TNT passed along this link to me.
Proud to be immortalized in your cartoon. Hopefully I'll never be on the receiving end. And yes, I'd like to burn that picture Erik posted. :-) |
 by Thorax O'Tool on 7/15/2009 @ 7:14pm | Qui? |
by NineInchNachos on 7/16/2009 @ 1:19pm | Derek keeps spanking eyman with his logic ray! "1033 forces all taxes to be voted on by the public. The impact of this is that it would be impossible to bond on anticipated revenues or prepare a multi-year projection. It's an irresponsible local government that does not forecast it's future revenues to see how it will or will not meet demands on its services and infrastructure. 1033 would make that impossible." blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics/2009/0... "Reductions in service for police, planning and engineering would be severe. There would be times that you could call for a police officer and none would be available. ... This initiative is being sold as a modest limit to growth in government. It’s not. In fact, I-1033 is a radical proposal that would remake state and local government in ways nobody living has ever seen." www.gateline.com/108/story/4626.html |
 by fredo on 7/16/2009 @ 8:52pm | I 1033 would index property taxes to the rate of inflation and population growth. That doesn't sound radical to me.
What does sound radical to me is following the practice in Olympia of the last few years. This practice involves hiring "economists" to make extremely optimistic revenue projections, then using those projections to make long term spending commitments. This is neither wise nor beneficial. |
by Thorax O'Tool on 7/17/2009 @ 12:48am | Fredo, that depends on two important conditions. That 1) Population continues to increase 2) Inflation continues For dealing with something as big as State budgeting, those are two shaky variables... Firstly, population does not always grow. With the Boeing issues in the 70s, people were fleeing WA so fast that it inspired a billboard about turning the lights out. We're not immune to this issue, and not just from Boeing (and their recent purchase in South Carolina). Steve Ballmer threatened a few weeks ago that Microsoft would outsource thousands of high-paying jobs if certain tax policies in DC were passed... Like it or not, economically we're held in a vise between Boeing and MS. We've already established that WA is a very highly taxed state. Without certain key employers, a lot of people could not afford to live here. So, population growth is not guaranteed. There are tens of thousands who will willingly leave WA if that's what it takes to find employment. Imagine what a 3% decrease would do to the local economy. What if it's 5%? This isn't a worst-case scenario, it's becoming increasingly likely as pressure on businesses mount. Secondly, your idea fails to consider deflation. We've had in the last 100 years 3 notable deflationary cycles. And please note that "deflation" doesn't necessarily mean a decrease in prices (though that often happens too). Deflation is a destruction of spending power, destruction of liquidity and importantly, credit. The most famous was, of course, the 1930s. Then there was some deflation in the 70s (prices didn't go down, but available credit, liquidity and spending power did). And now, we certainly are in deflation. Credit is drying up, only those who can get a loan are those who don't need/want one. Businesses can't get loans and CIT is teetering on failure. No matter how fast Uncle Sam keeps that press rolling, the new dollars aren't keeping pace with the destruction of credit. And don't get me started on the 22%+ in WA alone that housing prices have dropped since 2007. So, inflation is not guaranteed either. It's tragically bad timing. 1033 may have made sense in 2004 when things were on the upswing and "prosperity" was oozing out everywhere. Now that we're in a drastic decline and full-on hard reset, 1033 makes no sense at all. People compare it to TABOR, and rightfully so. Look up Oregon's Ballot measure 5. Our friends on the other side of the Columbia are worse off than we are. Also, I mentioned California's Prop 13 earlier. Look at that and look at the mess they're in. We're on a similar track, and we don't need 1033 to make that train ride any quicker or more severe. I do agree we're taxed way too much, and for what we pay we're getting the shaft. I agree that our current governor couldn't budget anything to save her life. I agree that the burden on WA families is worse than unreasonable. I agree that Olympia is nearly as wasteful and corrupt as is DC. BUT I don't think that 1033 goes about reducing the tax burden in a reasonable way. How it will cut and where it will cut will make things worse in the long run. We're in a helluva mess right now, on the federal, state and local levels. This is not our grandparents or parent's recession. Teradollar deficits, WA being 23% of it's own budget in the hole, the inevitable hundreds of billion dollar bailouts to the states, the refusal of our leaders to spend and act rationally will all eventually come home to roost in higher taxes, whether we like it or not. And Olympia will happily add on more burden in ways that are a lot worse than a property tax increase. |
by Thorax O'Tool on 7/17/2009 @ 1:17am | An opinion about Ballot Measure 5 from the Willamette Week. |
by fredo on 7/17/2009 @ 8:02am | Thorax-
When something bad happens there's a natural inclination to try to find out what caused it. Your posting and that of others has assigned California's problems to Prop 13 and Oregon's to Ballot measure 5. These initiatives are quickly becoming the No-on-1033s favorite "whipping boys." Prop 13 was passed almost 40 years ago and Ballot measure 5 dates back about 15 or 20 years. Those initiatives are historic and the current problems are contemporary so I don't see the connection. What's indisputable is that the West Coast states have had a propensity in recent years to provide public employee unions with unsustainable levels of compensation. You further mention that if there is a decrease in population or the economy deflates after 1033 passes state tax revenues will fall. Precisely...I think you've got it! If people leave the state there will be a decreasing need for public services and if the economy deflates that means prices will go down. The state would be able to negotiate lower prices for everything including the increasingly problematic state labor unions. Finally, remember that 1033 does not remove the ability that the public enjoys of increasing taxes for purposes which it deems necessary. So, where's the beef? |
by NineInchNachos on 7/17/2009 @ 9:45am |
my god. Derek Young is so awesome. .. Local control is a fundamental principle of American government. I would think that as a conservative you would favor that over centralized government. Why should I care what you decide to pay in taxes in your town and vice versa. Regardless, I'm not talking about tax rates. You do understand the difference between tax rates and tax receipts right? State and local government don't have to touch the sales tax for their collections to go up or down. Particularly for local government this is a rather bizarre idea since your initiative pretends that new economic activity is served for free. Is it often that you expand your watch business without buying more watches? Of course not." 1033 would direct revenue from economic development to property taxes until they were completely eliminated. What does that mean? Chaos. How could we afford the roads or police needed for these new or growing businesses? This is not about controlling growth in government. You're trying to push through a radical tax cut disguised as a responsible initiative like 601." We haven't passed a new tax in I don't know how long. At least 20 years. This initiative would dramatically cut taxes, not the other way around. If you want bad roads, more crime, and no parks... feel free to do so in Mukilteo. Leave my town to make its own decisions. "so restraint on the growth of government with inflation plus population growth is 'responsible' if done at the state level, but 'radical' if done at the city or county level? good luck with that." ~ Eyman Yes. That's because a city can grow far faster than population and inflation. In the last few years my city has doubled in revenue and expenses but only increased population by a fraction of that. Because the state is much larger that disparity is rarely all that large. Basically you're proposing we bankrupt cities whose business districts grow faster than its population. Conservatives should be horrified at the notion that we should actually punish cities who foster a healthy business climate. "why are you against the voters having a chance to vote on I-1033?" ~ Eyman I'm not. I'm simply pointing out the flaws in your initiative. blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics/2009/0... |
by NineInchNachos on 7/30/2009 @ 7:47pm | so I was checking out the twitter search that that dude from sitecrafting (you know the hipity hop one) wrote about in a recent sitecrafting blog post....
I tried searching for tim eyman. I like how several twitter people mention how eyman haunts their dreams... twitter.com/#search?q=tim%20eyman |
 by jenyum on 7/30/2009 @ 9:23pm | He's like the Eye of Sauron.
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