Global Warming News

[dave1949]

Aaaaaaah (drawn out) my health insurance rates are higher because of those who choose to smoke. I don't see any problem charging people more for being overweight, or if the choose to smoke, drink too much or don't want to exercise.

Maybe not, smoker's leave the scene earlier on average for a huge cost savings in elderly care. I can't say I'm proud to be a smoker, but the anti-smoking crusade is out of control by comparison to other risky behaviors.

Let me play Devil's Advocate a bit.
If you wanted to catalog and place a price premium on all 'risky/bad' behaviors, it would be quite an undertaking (nice pun, eh?) How far would you be willing to go? For example, should a newborn's parents pay more insurance/tax if they choose not to breast feed? Should a fried donut cost 10$ and a cake donut $5? If someone is carrying a genetic marker for an inherited disease, we could certainly save some money in the future by denying them the right to bear children. That is an act of volition after all. Should your grocery cart be surveyed for total sodium and sugars and be surcharged accordingly?

I think you would be talking about something that could occupy a roomful of philosophers for 20 years if you wish to fairly and uniformly apply the same standards to everyone that are applied to smokers.
Dave.

 

[dcyrilc]

Somewhere there has to be a balance on the land use restrictions, but I don't know where the line should be drawn.

Oregon touts their land use laws as being wonderful, protecting "valuable" farm land while they let Portland and it's burbs expand out onto the farms. And that is good farm land. Meanwhile, the restrictions that apply to the west side of the mountains, where the good farm land is also apply to the eastern 2/3 of the state which is basically dry and much of it has low value as farmland.

Politicians push to get industry to move into the Portland area, leading to expanding the metro area onto this farmland they think they are protecting, then wonder why cities on the east side of the mountains struggle. If they really want to protect farmland, then the growth should be on the east side of the mountains.

Build a house on your rural property? If it's timber land, you can't unless your parcel is something like 80 acres minimum, while if it's farmland, you have to prove you can make a good income (I don't remember how much, but it is in the $80K range) on the parcel.

Our 10 acres was grandfathered in, so we were able to build a house. I can step out the door, prune my trees, do a little thinning, pile and burn slash and intensively manage my timber much better than if I had to burn hydrocarbons driving 5 or 10 miles from town to work on the property.

What is the result of their poorly thought out and excessively restrictive land use laws that the greens think are wonderful? In the Portland area, they now advertise a lot of 5,000 sq. ft. as being "large"; they build a 3,500 sq. ft. house on a 4,000 sq. ft lot; they want everybody to live in a high rise condo. Property values--also read as "property costs if you are buying"--are much higher on the Oregon side of the Columbia than on the Washington side, then the politicians blame the evil real estate industry when surveys show housing is not very affordable. Oregon thinks the higher property values mean demand is driving up prices, while people flee to Washington where the looser laws let people live on decent sized lots with a real back yard and where they don't hear intimate activities in their neighbor's house 5 feet outside their window. The Vancouver area has been growing rapidly and now on both sides of the river they are talking about a new bridge so people in Washington can come over to Oregon to work, then go home to live.

But from the stories on this forum, it sounds like in Washington they have gone nuts with restrictions in rural areas; just different from Oregon.

There's got to be a balance. There's got to be some sense. But there isn't. Not yet anyway.

I heard on the news last night that Senate Democrates are proposing a state income tax of 4-1/2% on anyone who makes over $200K/year. That on top of what here around Seattle is a nearly 10% sales tax. I'm not within that group,but I have no doubt if that door is ever opened, it won't take long before they begin to add others to the list.

 

[dave1949]

Somewhere there has to be a balance on the land use restrictions, but I don't know where the line should be drawn.

Oregon touts their land use laws as being wonderful, protecting "valuable" farm land while they let Portland and it's burbs expand out onto the farms. And that is good farm land. Meanwhile, the restrictions that apply to the west side of the mountains, where the good farm land is also apply to the eastern 2/3 of the state which is basically dry and much of it has low value as farmland.

Politicians push to get industry to move into the Portland area, leading to expanding the metro area onto this farmland they think they are protecting, then wonder why cities on the east side of the mountains struggle. If they really want to protect farmland, then the growth should be on the east side of the mountains.

Build a house on your rural property? If it's timber land, you can't unless your parcel is something like 80 acres minimum, while if it's farmland, you have to prove you can make a good income (I don't remember how much, but it is in the $80K range) on the parcel.

Our 10 acres was grandfathered in, so we were able to build a house. I can step out the door, prune my trees, do a little thinning, pile and burn slash and intensively manage my timber much better than if I had to burn hydrocarbons driving 5 or 10 miles from town to work on the property.

What is the result of their poorly thought out and excessively restrictive land use laws that the greens think are wonderful? In the Portland area, they now advertise a lot of 5,000 sq. ft. as being "large"; they build a 3,500 sq. ft. house on a 4,000 sq. ft lot; they want everybody to live in a high rise condo. Property values--also read as "property costs if you are buying"--are much higher on the Oregon side of the Columbia than on the Washington side, then the politicians blame the evil real estate industry when surveys show housing is not very affordable. Oregon thinks the higher property values mean demand is driving up prices, while people flee to Washington where the looser laws let people live on decent sized lots with a real back yard and where they don't hear intimate activities in their neighbor's house 5 feet outside their window. The Vancouver area has been growing rapidly and now on both sides of the river they are talking about a new bridge so people in Washington can come over to Oregon to work, then go home to live.

But from the stories on this forum, it sounds like in Washington they have gone nuts with restrictions in rural areas; just different from Oregon.

There's got to be a balance. There's got to be some sense. But there isn't. Not yet anyway.

I can see the rationale for some of the restrictions you cite, but it's like somehow, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

The 80 acre min. timberland home site is trying to prevent the forest lands from being fragmented. When that happens, their logging and wildlife values are both diminished. Not a bad goal. Loggers need to deal with one owner of 500 acres, not 50 owners who will never agree to harvest and management activities enmass on the same schedule.

If one were allowed to build in clusters or very low density in the timber zone, but had to agree to a regional forest management approach, it might actually work better.

The requirement that one must make ~$80K from farming on a parcel inorder to build a home there must be an attempt to support farming as a viable industry in that area. Also not a bad goal. There is little doubt small-scale farmers have been under pressure for a long time. Although, in Maine the trend has changed to more small and large farms and the mid-sized are disappearing. Either they are large producers of commodity type crops or small producers of specialty high dollar crops to succeed.

Suburbs are swallowing up farmland everywhere. It's a national disgrace that has been going on for decades. I read articles about the 'burbs losing their appeal lately, and people revitalizing city neighborhoods to escape the 'burbs - which has a certain humor to it Time will tell if that is a real trend for families or really only able to attract retirees and singles/childless.

Towns around here claim they are going broke supplying services to sprawling home sites. This would be mostly road work and school bus travel, police and EMS/fire coverage since they don't supply any other services. If you look at the cost to maintain an extra 5 miles of road for 5 or 10 new homes spread along it, you can see the additional property taxes (~$30K) don't cover the added costs. Especially where snow plowing and winter occurs.

No doubt, when the results aren't showing what was intended, something is wrong with the process.
Dave.

 

[dcyrilc]

Aaaaaaah (drawn out) my health insurance rates are higher because of those who choose to smoke. I don't see any problem charging people more for being overweight, or if the choose to smoke, drink too much or don't want to exercise.

Several years the state received monies from the tobacco companies for this reason, however, I have never heard of anyone whom the state paid medical bills for because they smoked. Everyone I have ever known has been responsible for their own medical bills. Personally, I think the state simply pocketed the money.

 

[dave1949]

Several years the state received monies from the tobacco companies for this reason, however, I have never heard of anyone whom the state paid medical bills for because they smoked. Everyone I have ever known has been responsible for their own medical bills. Personally, I think the state simply pocketed the money.

They must have spent some of it here on TV spots encouraging quitting and I think we have a toll free smoking cessation helpline! I'm pretty sure the majority of the tobacco settlements went straight into the general funds.
Dave.

 

[dcyrilc]

They must have spent some of it here on TV spots encouraging quitting and I think we have a toll free smoking cessation helpline! I'm pretty sure the majority of the tobacco settlements went straight into the general funds.
Dave.

I would have to agree. The funny thing though is that they suposedly collected them on behalf of smokers like you and me.

 

[piller]

The state of North Carolina recently sued TVA over emissions from coal fired power plants and won. TVA has been forced to move more quickly to install clean scrubber technology at it's coal plants.

 

[dave1949]

I would have to agree. The funny thing though is that they suposedly collected them on behalf of smokers like you and me.

Maine Tobacco Settlement Money:
Fund for a Healthy Maine - Allocations and Uses History

Washington:
Health Costs & Budgets - Washington - Kaiser State Health Facts

Dave.

 

[dcyrilc]

Maine Tobacco Settlement Money:
Fund for a Healthy Maine - Allocations and Uses History

Washington:
Health Costs & Budgets - Washington - Kaiser State Health Facts

Dave.

I notice $85M was spent on other. I would be curious what the health expenses were.

 

[dave1949]

I notice $85M was spent on other. I would be curious what the health expenses were.

Well, they don't seem to be saving it to treat smoking-related illnesses whatever they are spending it on. Maine even deallocated $5 million I noticed, probably trying to scrape money together. State budgets are tight now.

In another Kaiser link related to Washington state, they noted that it cost $1.95 billion in smoking-related medical costs. In the same year they said 8,400 Washington State residents died directly due to smoking. Do you think those numbers add up? That would be ~$232,000 per smoker death, although who knows what's included in the $1.95 billion. I have a suspicion that no matter what a person actually died from, if they smoked, it gets recorded as a smoking death.
Dave.