> Some drivers can apply for Low-Income Discount or Low-Income Tax Credit for Residents.
> A 50% discount is available for low-income vehicle owners enrolled in the Low-Income Discount Plan (LIDP). This discount begins after the first 10 trips in a calendar month and applies to all peak period trips after that for the remainder of the calendar month.
The revenue also goes towards public transit, and the congestion charge applies mainly to the wealthiest part of the wealthiest borough.
I hate this distinctly American idea that no policy can cause any detriment to any disadvantaged people at all, even if the policy effects are incredibly income-progressive overall. This is how we end up with carveouts for every special interest group in every single policy, the populace justifying turnstile hopping, lack of traffic enforcement by police, opposition to speed and red light cameras, opposition to rezoning unless it's built by free-range grass-fed vegan union labour and 100% below market, etc.
I mean, if we're gonna pick a group to impact, the ones who aren't already deeply struggling seem like the place to do it. Given the parent poster's commenting history here, though, I don't think they have a genuine concern in "disparate impact" at all.
>I hate this distinctly American idea that no policy can cause any detriment to any disadvantaged people at all
This "Distinctly American idea" you cite does not at all exist.
Tens of millions watch a news channel that openly stated we should euthanize homeless people. Millions more moved to a crazier channel because that one wasn't lying enough
They vote against free school lunch programs that cost very little.
They hate "welfare queens" with a passion, despite that being a lie, and still being a lie decades later.
Democrats had no qualms voting for the Crime Bill back in the 90s, and were willing to turn around and get aggressive about the border to win an election.
>This is how we end up with carveouts for every special interest group in every single policy
No, the reason we get so many special interest carve outs in the US is that special interest groups fund election campaigns. Fix campaign funding (IE, make it publicly funded and extremely time limited) and you make it significantly easier for people who eschew bribery to be and stay politicians.
Sure, HN has a strong "Not perfect should never be done" bias, because HN is full of turbonerds that crave validation for how smart they are and always need to pipe up with a nitpick to be heard. 95% of the time, the exact "complaint" someone on HN makes up was already noted and covered in the very article. We aren't allowed to sass people for not reading the article.
This is not the case off of HN and in reality. Conservatives are perfectly happy doing "Obvious and common sense" measures that actually have insane second order effects. They insist tariffs are a good policy the way they are being implemented. Democrats want all sorts of things that are not at all perfect and would be happy to have slightly fewer new problems than the same problems our grandparents had to fight about.
> Democrats had no qualms voting for the Crime Bill back in the 90s, and were willing to turn around and get aggressive about the border to win an election.
this seems awfully coy. Why not just say who cheerled the bill and who went on the TV circuit to explain how great it was because of "super predators" - nice euphemism.
"Democrats" isn't some amorphous thing we can't tag to individual people. The last president of the USA and his sponsor (Bill Clinton) were adamant to get that bill passed. Biden spearheaded the legislation. This isn't just some "he voted yea on it!" sort of thing.
> Some drivers can apply for Low-Income Discount or Low-Income Tax Credit for Residents.
> A 50% discount is available for low-income vehicle owners enrolled in the Low-Income Discount Plan (LIDP). This discount begins after the first 10 trips in a calendar month and applies to all peak period trips after that for the remainder of the calendar month.
The revenue also goes towards public transit, and the congestion charge applies mainly to the wealthiest part of the wealthiest borough.