City wastes resources (including the 42-cent stamp) to threaten a blind elderly woman with a property lien over a single penny she owes in unpaid utilities.
Obama’s fake (so far) transparency.
State’s false paternity claim costs man $12,000, his job, his family, and lands him in jail four times. It takes a newspaper all of an hour to determine that he isn’t the kid’s father. Matt Welch wrote about these infuriating paternity laws in reason a few years ago. Sad to see little appears to have changed.
Last year’s best nature photography.
Not sure if this is good or bad news. It’s bad, arbitrary, paternalistic government. But it’s government that’s so inept, the online poker will go on. I guess that on the whole, that makes it good news.
Speaking of poker, World Series of Poker main event winner Peter Eastgate will have to fork over a jaw-dropping 73 percent of his winnings to the Danish government. Gotta’ love that Scandinavian socialism. Eastgate’s winnings will go to the Danish tax collection agency, which goes by the gigglingly-appropriate acronym, SKAT.
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TheAgitator.com
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“Peter Eastgate will have to fork over a jaw-dropping 73 percent of his winnings to the Danish government. Gotta’ love that Scandinavian socialism.”
“Taxes are the price we pay for civilization.”
I believe it was Oliver Wendell Holmes who got that completely back asswards.
Taxes are what the armed-robber state extracts at gunpoint from its victims, who would get along just fine without being molested, thank you very much.
The thing about the penny is really a non story. Most of us did not even have to read it to know exactly how it happened. The fact that she is blind is just a bonus to make it seem more like a story.
FTA: “A computer automatically printed the letters for any account with a balance remaining, and they were not reviewed by staff before being sent out, Marcoccio said.
“It would be fiscally irresponsible for me to have staff weed through the bills and pull out any below a certain amount,” Marcoccio said. ” And what would that amount be?”
——————————————
Just pay the penny and don’t pretend that it is newsworthy that a computer printed a form letter. The additional resources needed to avoid these occassional occurances would be the real waste.
“The additional resources needed to avoid these occassional occurances would be the real waste.”
But really they wouldn’t. I work for a company that operates utilities for municipalities. When we send out past due notices, we run letters for balances starting at (I think) $10.00, so we aren’t chasing people that owe a penny. The computer only spits out what you ask it to. You can argue about where the bar should be set, but it’s not true that it must be set at $0.00.
Also, even if they did send out the past due notices starting at $0.01, the city could have saved face by just writing off the balance when it learned of the outstanding penny instead of insisting that liening up the house would be the right result.
Yes, yes, it’s completely understandable how the billing happened, and the outrage is excessive. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be improved. The computer should really be programmed with a threshold and not send out reminder notices below a certain amount — if it’s under 25 cents it can wait until the next utility bill, and be added onto that.
Why didn’t the city roll over the past due of that month into the next month’s current due? Seems a bit ridiculous to me…
It is not one penny from last month’s bill. That would certainly roll over to the next month, like it does everywhere. It is a hold over from the previous year. I agree it is a small amount. SO small that the the blind woman should just pay it. It is a non-issue.
Eric, I don’t doubt you but there are so many people in the world that know how to work the system that I think if it ever became common knowledge that you ignore up to 10.00 of payment shortage then a whole lot of people would start shorting their utility bill. Hell, companies would figure out the exact threshold below “full payment” they could get away with and stick to it.
Yes, the limit must be set somewhere. Why is it wrong to just keep it simple, and fair for everyone, and say we have two categories “Paid in Full” and “Not Paid in Full”.
No guesswork, no BS. Equal treatment for all.
The issue is the threat of property lien etc. doesn’t match the “crime” of owing ONE PENNY. If she owes it she should pay it. Software can do whatever you tell it to do. Where does the threshold get set? These are all valid questions and thoughts, but again the REAL issue is crime != punishment.
Chris in AL — Why not use the IRS standard, where they don’t seek to collect on tax bills under $1? (they also don’t issue refunds of $1 or less, though they will if you ask them to). To say that this would result in a litany of people underpaying their bills by $0.99 is patently ridiculous.
Ok, this penny thing is assinine and stupid.
You owe a penny. A computer churned out a couple thousand of these at a small cost. 42 cents per, plus the cost of return postage, plus the minimal cost of a simple system that automatically churns out bills.
Of those 2 thousand, probably a tiny handful were for less than a buck.
Write a check for .01, pay the 42 cents postage. Total cost? 43 cents and 2 minutes of your time. Case closed. No stress. No federal case, no employees whose 40K a year job is to save a few postage stamps.
Until some dumb ass makes a federal case out of it.
The cost of the reporter’s time ALONE probably doubled the total cost of the whole deal. Forcing the people in charge to even reply adds more cost.
Ok, it MIGHT have been better if the system were smarter and didn’t send the tiny handful of bills that were less than a buck in the first place. But it did. Deal with it.
The whole Lien thing? That’s not the penalty for owing a penny. It’s the penalty for not paying what you owe. What utter moron wouldn’t spend 2 minutes and 43 cents to stop a LIEN on their home?
As to property leins: having the ability to place leins allows the city to avoid much of the risk of default. If they are made to bear that risk like an Inverstor Owned Utility then they get to trash your credit when you don’t pay that one cent. Pick your poison.
Those taxes are ridiculous. I don’t understand why professional gamblers (like Schwartz) choose to live in a high-tax state like NY. Just become a resident of Florida or Texas (or any of the other states that don’t collect state income tax) and save yourself a ton of money!
Andrew
I think setting the standard at a dollar is just fine as well. It should be up to the company. I did not say people would short their bills for .99. I said they would for $10.00. And they would.
So as you say, set the limit at $1.00 like the IRS. Fine. But if this exact same article was not about 1 penny, but instead the whole article was “Utility company threatens property lien on blind woman’s home over $1.08!” it would be just as outrageous. All the comments would be the same. What a waste, why bother, why isn’t the cutoff at $2.00?
With the current economic situation, there are plenty of people out there getting liens on their property because of $100.00 they owe and cannot pay. Why not make 10,000 people that all owe a penny pay up and give that guy a break? If you are within one penny of not having a lien on your property, a whole lot of people think you should just shut up.
Which brings me back to my original statement that there is nothing wrong with everyone just being expected to pay what they owe in full, and everyone that did not pay in full gets a letter. I find it amusing that, on a Libertarian website, suggesting that everyone should just pay what they owe would get so many thumbs down, lol.
Bob, I think you and I are in the minority with our views on this one.
I received a registered letter a few years ago from my local library telling me that I owed $0.10 in fines. The cost of mailing the letter was $7.80. I couldn’t figure out why somebody just didn’t tell me that I owed a dime in fines since I’m in there at least twice a week? On my next trip I paid the dime and asked the Head Librarian what was up with the letter? Her reply was that they had a kid from the local High School doing his 10 hours of Community Service that he needed in order to graduate. He was supposed to sort the letters as they were printed by the computer. Anything under $1.00 was to be discarded, $1.00 – $10.00 was to get a letter and $10.00 + was to get a registered letter. The kid didn’t want to be there so he reversed it. Everybody who owed under $1.00 got a registered letter. Nobody bothered to double check him. The library spent over $1000 in mailing the letters.
Bob,
The woman is blind. See any reason why she might not even know she owes a penny?
WHY IS THE CITY PROVIDING UTILITIES? They are competing with my UtilitiesMart private enterprise (where I blow off balances under $1 because I’m not a moron).
That’s a good point. Though she must have made one hell of a guess when paying her bill in the first place, eh?
Radley,
Here is an article from Cardplayer Magazine that states Eastgate moved to London during the 3 month delay for the final table. The “November 9″ were all paid 9th place money in July while he was still a resident of Denmark, but during the break from the final table he established residency in London, where gambling winnings are completely tax free.
So, it is thought he will only have to pay the 73% on the money paid during July and not the remaining ~$8 million he was paid in September.
Good for him if he gets to keep it.
http://www.cardplayer.com/poker-news/article/5527/governments-take-huge-bite-out-of-wsop-final-table-pool
Moral of stories 1 (penny bill) and 3 (paternity): Don’t ignore these things.
Make a phone call (even the lowest ranking customer service representative can usually write off a penny, especially in a city of 42 thousand people.)
FWIW, the “Utility” is water and sewer, and the bill from “last” fiscal year covered usage into July of this year, 4 months ago. If the bills are semi-annual, there hasn’t even been a second bill to roll it onto yet; if they’re quarterly maybe one bill has gone through. In any case, it’s a rolling balance, there’s no reason for the city to have done anything except let it go by.
Is this a real lien, like you have to go down to the Registry of Deeds to get rid of it? My city published their scam ^h^h^h^h process: Recall that utilities are for value received and are not deductible the way property taxes are. If a resident of my city doesn’t pay his water tax (and in my city there are no residential meters, so it is a tax, not ad valorem, maybe) then the city will add a 10% penalty, and add that amount to the property tax. I’m not sure if there’s a recorded lien in that, but they get 110%, and the home-owner gets a deduction equal to more than 10%.
“(and in my city there are no residential meters, so it is a tax, not ad valorem, maybe)”
Not at all. You are paying the operating cost of the utility plus debt service etc. What you are getting is water service to your property. Even if you never use a drop, there is still value in having that water service. For one thing, the Department of Health Services will let you build a house there. For another, fire protection. If you had a meter and were billed on your consumptive use, would you consider the fixed portion of the bill a tax?
“Furthermore, [the Department of Public Welfare] has experienced grave injustice as a result of [Walter Sharpe's] failure to address this matter in a timely fashion,” a joint answer filed by Domestic Relations and the state Department of Public Welfare states.
The agency claims that because of Walter Sharpe’s delay in challenging paternity, it is unable to recoup support payments from the real father.
“As a result of [Walter Sharpe's] delayed actions in this matter, DPW is forced to suffer unfair and irreversible injury.”
Jesus FUCK these people are UNBELIEVABLE! What utter, contemptible audacity! This government agency has spent 7 years ruining a man’s life, and they claim that they have suffered unbearable injury?
Smurfy, yes, what I’m getting is water service to the property, but the amount I pay is not based on the value of the water received, nor even on the value of the property served. Each resident pays the same water fee (and the same sewer fee, which is an (improper?) fraction of the water fee.)
Just because they say “This part of what you must pay for the privilege of living here is labeled ‘water’” doesn’t make it so.
In any case property taxes are treated differently in terms of being deductible than utility fees, so once it’s moved from being labeled “water fee” to “extra property tax” then it’s definitely a deductible tax.
Wildlife picture #5 (the colorful scaled head) is perfectly symmetrical. Not nearly symmetrical. Pixel for pixel symmetrical. Is it really very pure photography, at that point? I know photographers retouch, but give me a break!
The story about the paternity claim is breathtaking. What’s worse is that no wrongdoers will face any consequences whatsoever.
[...] and “marriage” benefits have only expanded, with “child support” being taken from fathers who can prove with DNA evidence that they are of no relation to the child. There was [...]