Quote:
Originally Posted by wong21fr
You mean an overly ambitious transit plan that relied on massive tax increases who's main proponent resigned in disgrace for screwing here bodyguard was a risky proposition? Perish the thought.
The regressive sales tax increase alone on this proposal probably doomed it. It would have made Nashville extremely uncompetitive with surrounding municipalities.
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I recall now you had a laser beam focus on those sales taxes. Given that it was a veritable 'perfect storm' I think adding that to the mix of problems makes sense.
There was a lot of business and tourist focused taxes as well but they needed everybody to chip-in in some way. In hindsight they probably tried to do too much for their size and density.
There's an old saying in sales that says "Sell the sizzle, not the steak." We may decide to buy a new car for good reasons but
what we actually buy has more to do with how much we like the sizzle.
Consider FasTracks. People bought the sizzle because they were getting steak. Trains were the sizzle and a majority felt they would get a benefit in that their city/county was part of the party.
Too many people in Nashvile, like a large majority (for an election) didn't feel like they were getting any
benefit. If there's no steak why should they pay for somebody else's sizzle?
I wondered about Mayor Barry's mess but at the end of the day I believe it came down to old fashioned politics. Put simply "People vote their pocketbook" which encapsulates both of our views.