phantom tollbooths in Davis Sq. ...

[an-art-worker.livejournal.com]

apropos of nothing and not a serious proposal but I was thinking about sales taxes last night, the discussion of tolls on 93 south and something to do with all the border violence going on in the world these days. Suddenly I had this image of tollbooths/checkpoints on the roads entering Davis Sq. Weird but interesting to speculate on.

The growth in popularity of the sq. has brought higher rents and housing prices, higher prices in stores and bars and general gentrification. The city of Somerville and the property owners benefit but the residents don't. Would be interesting to have a toll that went to offset the costs of gentrification to people who actually live here.

Comments

Re: You can't eat market value!

[turil.livejournal.com]

Real Estate is pretty stable, but the bubble that caused the skyrocketing values in the past decade here was an anomoly. If you buy low and sell high, then you're good.

And I'm sorry to hear about your 401K! I know nothing about such fancy things, and just assumed that they were stable investments like my own retirement fund (with a fixed interest rate).

Re: You can't eat market value!

[komos.livejournal.com]

Generally speaking, real estate values may slow and possibly stagnate, but it's rare that they will outright decline without some significant triggering event.

Re: You can't eat market value!

[ukelele.livejournal.com]

The stock market goes up at a fairly steady 10% a year when looked at over a long enough time span, but is susceptible to enormous fluctuations over a period of a few years, particularly if you're aggressively invested. This makes it a fine way to invest for retirement when it's still several decades away, but you need to shift to less stock markety things, or at least much more conservative stocks, as retirement nears. Some people found this out the really hard way during the dotcom bust.