People that walk or bike are also more likely to do small shopping locally. This benefits the local economy and gets less money to international big box retailers, which generally pay less taxes.
If you drive by a small market you often won't park your car to go there. Cars and trucks destroy streets fast. Having less of them keeps repairs less frequent. Infrastructure for walking and biking can exist for multiple decades or even millennia
So you’re saying that people should do shopping locally, spend more, and waste more time to prop up inefficient businesses who don’t benefit from economies of scale? Tell that to voters and then try to win an election. Society exists to make our lives easier, not to prop up as many businesses and employees as possible as a make-work make-taxes program.
Oh my god the obsession with 'economics of scale' is such narrow minded nonsense.
Shopping locally is more efficient, because the distribution network distributes things locally much more efficiently then a bunch of housewives in their SUVs.
Sure its cheaper for the shop providing the food, but for the society its more expensive. What you are completely missing is the massive cost of all the infrastructure and the massive subsidizes therein to create these centralized stores. And then the massive cost in time and capital investment for every users to buy a car to pick that stuff up.
You are also ignoring the massive waste this creates because people only go shopping every 1-2 weeks. And you are ignore the lack of fresh foods in the food system because of this behavior. That of course Americans eventually pay in their medical systems.
If you actually do some research you will see the systematic bias that is in the zoning code, infrastructure cost calculation and services. Walmart often consumer more in just police services then they pay in taxes. Walmart is systematically gaming the property rights system to pay almost no taxes. And yet Walmart uses a huge amount of land and requires a huge amount of public infrastructure to sustain itself.
If you really need to do some massive pickup of stuff for a party or something there are still larger stores you can go to as well, just not for everyday stuff.
Actually having a shop where I can locally pick up fresh food every day or every other day is actually much more convenient and saves far more time. And I know this is crazy for Americans to consider, but as a society it would be nice if people without a car could also buy food sometimes. This video points this out:
Cities only exist because of economies of scale! Public transit, road maintenance, utilities delivery, public recreation facilities, and the plethora of small and large businesses are more efficient in a city because of economies of scale.
What people don’t benefit from is laws to artificially benefit small businesses at the expense of the consumer. Here in New York, we have this stupid law that one corporate entity can only have one liquor retail license. This law was created at the “behest” of the lobby of liquor store owners. The end result of this is that liquor is more expensive than my hometown of Vancouver, despite NYS collecting a significantly lower tax rate than BC province. That money all flew into private coffers, and the consumer still gets bent over in the end.
I also take issue with the implication that Walmart incurring policing costs is bad for society. The implication is that Walmart should either have private police or be a shoplifting free for all. The former is a bad idea because Walmart police don’t have the same responsibility or accountability to the public as public police. The latter is a bad idea because society will collapse without property rights.
> Cities only exist because of economies of scale!
Sure if you want to have an intellectual debate about what the economics of scale means then that's fine but your point about economics of scale about suburban super-markets was still wrong and that was the context of my critic.
The rest of your post is irrelevant to my point. I have not advocated for any policy specifically to help small business. Small shops in cities can and are operate by major cooperation. There is no contradiction between large companies and small/urban locations. Not sure why you are even bringing this up. Are you so 'America'-brained that you think large companies can only exist in large commercial zones right of highway exchanges?
> I also take issue with the implication that Walmart incurring policing costs is bad for society.
I didn't say the issue is that its incurring policing cost, I said the cost it incurs is higher then the taxes its paying. The whole point of taxes is that they finance the operation of a geographical area. And everybody living or operating in that area should help finance that area.
If somebody operates in that area that incurs more cost then benefits then that somebody should only continue to be doing so if people consider it a 'social good'. And supporting Wallmart a highly profitable company, clearly doesn't fall under that.
So designing policies so that a multi-billion $ company can show up and extract value from your town is nonsensically stupid.
In fact you are stealing from other business and people in your area to give more profits to wallmart.
> The implication is that Walmart should either have private police or be a shoplifting free for all.
No 'the implication' is that when a community does land use, infrastructure and tax planning it should consider facts, and consider cost to provide services and infrastructure for to those areas.
The fact is, most communities make most of their money in the 'down town' that is true even for very small town and even villages.
What you are proposing is basically that a community should finance, build and maintain a lot of public infrastructure, then finance continue police and other services far away from where most people actually live to protect cooperate property (and specifically the parking lot) all while Wallmart does everything in its power to pay the absolute minimum back to the community it is in. Both by local tricks and by tricks on a federal level.
If you drive by a small market you often won't park your car to go there. Cars and trucks destroy streets fast. Having less of them keeps repairs less frequent. Infrastructure for walking and biking can exist for multiple decades or even millennia