🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <3v358k$k1n@miwok.nbn.com> todd@linex.com (Todd Ourston) writes:
    >>Do you how much Yosemite would be worth to real estate
    >>developers? Not to mention the HUGE property tax base that it
    >>would yield?
    >>
    >First of all, there is no federal property tax. There is a
    >capital gains tax that kicks in when property is sold, but
    >the Republicans are trying to eliminate that as quickly as
    >possible.
    >
    >Second, the public at large would not receive a net benefit
    >from opening up Yosemite to real estate development unless
    >the property was sold for more than it is worth to the public
    >at large as a National Park.

Sigh -- you missed the whole point.

Grazing lands are NOT subsidized, UNLESS you want to count Yosemite as a
multi-tens-of-billions-of-$$$ subsidy.

No money goes from the Feds to the ranchers. While there are apparently
laws in some places that do not allow other people (non-ranchers) to bid for
the lands, I doubt if there are enough people willing to put out $$$ to
keep any significant portion of the lands out of "use". Come to think of
it, if they was serious, they could buy ONE cow and bid ...

To keep by law land out of general use and restrict it for a very narrowly
defined use is NOT a subsidy.

If you keep on using that word, then Yosemite is about the biggest subsidy
around, because it has a huge value as developmental land, plus of course
it would be a great tax base.

And to speculate on what Yosemite is worth is something only a free marketplace
can do, as a government is useless in figuring out "real worth".



-- 
"I didn't do it, nobody saw me, and you can't prove it!" - B. Simpson

These opinions are MINE, and you can't have 'em! (But I'll rent 'em cheap ...)