More on the failure of the NYC congestion tax from the Carbon Tax Center [who have already posted a Top 10 Reasons piece to Grist] — definitely read the whole thing. This tidbit reminds us that any policy change appears to create “winners and losers” — and those who think they are losers are almost always better organized:
…A chemical engineer and policy analyst who worked with congestion pricing theorist and Nobel Laureate Bill Vickrey, honed in on the winners/losers conundrum:
The central problem policy problem, both here and around the world, continues to be that the losers from any policy change know who they are and are always far better organized than are the winners. Indeed, some winners are bamboozled into thinking that they will be losers. Nowhere is this more true than with congestion pricing — invariably this has been opposed by a majority before introduction but is warmly welcomed by a majority afterwards.
This is why political leadership is so important. Such leadership emerges in New York only very rarely if ever and is one of the reasons New York continues to decline relative to other states; History tells us that this has long been true however; consider how T.R. got on the national ticket with McKinley in 1900.
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