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Vancouver-Age |OT| 125 Years

B-Dex

Member
Why are people defending a vote for a private company to get a tax tacked on to an entire province's purchases for the benefit of one region?
 

beat

Member
Why are people defending a vote for a private company to get a tax tacked on to an entire province's purchases for the benefit of one region?

I'm 99% sure the sales tax will only be increased in Metro Vancouver. Also, that one region contains over 50% of the entire province's population.

And it's a crown corporation with significant government involvement in its decision making.

Besides the words "people", "vote", and "tax", I'm not sure anything about your question was correct.
 

B-Dex

Member
Translink had the govt. transportation commissioner position dissolved and is run by a non-elected board of directors. Oh and a mayoral council that has no power or say.

And even if you for some reason drink their kool-aid. The new committee that would have to oversee them. LOL. Is run by a man trying to shill cars.

Translink is trash. Just wait for yet another fare increase and pay parking rates at park and rides to skyrocket even further. Not to mention the laughable bad decision to waste millions on a parking lot no one asked for and is never used.

But by all means let's let the clowns have more money.
 
Translink had the govt. transportation commissioner position dissolved and is run by a non-elected board of directors. Oh and a mayoral council that has no power or say.

And even if you for some reason drink their kool-aid. The new committee that would have to oversee them. LOL. Is run by a man trying to shill cars.

Translink is trash. Just wait for yet another fare increase and pay parking rates at park and rides to skyrocket even further. Not to mention the laughable bad decision to waste millions on a parking lot no one asked for and is never used.

But by all means let's let the clowns have more money.

Insults without any provocation? That'll win the day.
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
I'm cross-posting this here because fuck Kia Richmond nobody should go there ever

okay this goes here

Remember how I posted about being carshopping?

Well, I put down a deposit at Kia Richmond for a credit check and then cancelled the deal. They became little kids and won't give me my deposit :lol

I quote: "yeah well I know the law so go exercise it if you want your money back we have lawyers on standby, we'll make it as difficult as we can for you"

So I did the only right thing and sent a formal complaint to the vehicle dealer authority (the body of law governing car dealers) and the better business bureau. The vehicle authority just emailed me back and formally accepted my complaint, now the dealership has two weeks to respond or there'll be a formal investigation.

Fuckers wanna be little kids over 125.-? If I just make them lose one customer with bad reviews and complaints and making them spend time and effort to respond they've lost that money already.

Fucking Kia Richmond.

FUCKERS JUST CAVED MORE THAN ZEDGE WHEN HE SEES A WELL-COMBED HORSE

GETTING MY DEPOSIT BACK 24H AFTER THEY RECEIVED THE FORMAL COMPLAINT, SUCK ITTTTTTT KIA RICHMOND
 

B-Dex

Member
Insults without any provocation? That'll win the day.

Are you translink? Or is saying drink the Kool-aid an insult now? And if anyone was legitimately insulted wouldn't it be me for the other poster trying to call me ignorant and that I don't know what I'm talking about?
 

MutFox

Banned
I'm torn about voting yes or no...
Though I don't trust Translink.

That committee headed by Pattison.
They say he'll head it for only a bit, then who?

I wonder if the whole HST vote didn't change in BC,
if they'd still be asking for a tax increase.
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
I'm torn about voting yes or no...
Though I don't trust Translink.

That committee headed by Pattison.
They say he'll head it for only a bit, then who?

I wonder if the whole HST vote didn't change in BC,
if they'd still be asking for a tax increase.

vote yes

even if you don't trust translink, we need that money in transportation funding...
 
Are you translink? Or is saying drink the Kool-aid an insult now? And if anyone was legitimately insulted wouldn't it be me for the other poster trying to call me ignorant and that I don't know what I'm talking about?

The other poster didn't call you ignorant. He just said your question was partially incorrect.

I'm just saying that mud-slinging and provocative language rarely work in convincing people. There are reasonable arguments to vote "no", and they don't have to be dressed up in "Translink is trash" comments.
 

beat

Member
Are you translink? Or is saying drink the Kool-aid an insult now? And if anyone was legitimately insulted wouldn't it be me for the other poster trying to call me ignorant and that I don't know what I'm talking about?

So where's the evidence that the sales tax increase is province-wide, rather than for the Vancouver region? That's a factual claim you made and as far as I can tell, it's incorrect.
 
Hello everybody,

I've been looking at the upcoming Whitecaps games, and trying to decide where to sit (going in a group of 4). I noticed that section 241-243 is cheaper than 212-215. Looking for some advice on good seats. Thanks!
 

NetMapel

Guilty White Male Mods Gave Me This Tag
So Vancitybuzz just published this new article that contains a heat map using census data on the dominant immigrant group as per area.

http://www.vancitybuzz.com/2015/05/immigrant-map-live-metro-vancouver/

593-984x500.png

Seems like some of the most expensive areas such as Kits, City of West Vancouver, North Vancouver... etc are all dominated by non-Chinese. More specifically, those areas' dominant immigrant seems to be from UK or Iran. Very interesting to see considering the flurry of articles in recent times about the big bad Chinese foreign investors buying up all these expensive houses. However, census data seems to suggests otherwise ? While Chinese do dominate in most other areas north of Fraser river, the truly most expensive areas don't seem to be dominated by the Chinese. What do you guys say about this ?
 
Well, I'm not surprised my little neck of the woods is a Taiwanese majority, although that seems to be changing.

Honestly, the demonizing of Chinese investors seems like a barely disguised way to bring out the dog whistle racism.
 

Cheerilee

Member
The big bad Chinese investors didn't immigrate, and don't reside in the city, they're just using foreign real estate as a bank. That's why people want to put a tax on empty buildings. I'm guessing that makes their purchases unlikely to show up on a map of where immigrants reside, and even if they did, the problem would have to be pretty severe for these investors to show up as some sort of majority population.

The map seems to make sense to me. North Van (or at least some area of it) used to call itself "the British Properties". That's why there's so much UK there. I have hardly anything to do with that area myself, but come to think of it, I've heard people say that Iranians are a thing up there.

West Van used to have a bunch of UK people in tiny houses, but they're apparently growing old and getting pushed out by high property values and the new owners are building large dream homes they can't afford, and then renting out the basements to make ends meet.

Richmond is Chinese. Surrey is Indian. There's a blip of India around Main Street, from 49th down to Marine.
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
The big bad Chinese investors didn't immigrate, and don't reside in the city, they're just using foreign real estate as a bank. That's why people want to put a tax on empty buildings. I'm guessing that makes their purchases unlikely to show up on a map of where immigrants reside, and even if they did, the problem would have to be pretty severe for these investors to show up as some sort of majority population.

The map seems to make sense to me. North Van (or at least some area of it) used to call itself "the British Properties". That's why there's so much UK there. I have hardly anything to do with that area myself, but come to think of it, I've heard people say that Iranians are a thing up there.

West Van used to have a bunch of UK people in tiny houses, but they're apparently growing old and getting pushed out by high property values and the new owners are building large dream homes they can't afford, and then renting out the basements to make ends meet.

Richmond is Chinese. Surrey is Indian. There's a blip of India around Main Street, from 49th down to Marine.

dingdingding 100 points
 
The big bad Chinese investors didn't immigrate, and don't reside in the city, they're just using foreign real estate as a bank. That's why people want to put a tax on empty buildings. I'm guessing that makes their purchases unlikely to show up on a map of where immigrants reside, and even if they did, the problem would have to be pretty severe for these investors to show up as some sort of majority population.

Are "empty buildings" hyperbole or nah? Either way I have no problem with foreign investment but even as a self-identified tory it's hard to argue against some sort of tax in this situation.
 

Cheerilee

Member
Are "empty buildings" hyperbole or nah? Either way I have no problem with foreign investment but even as a self-identified tory it's hard to argue against some sort of tax in this situation.

I don't know the details. Apparently some people are getting filthy rich off the growth of China, but the Communist Government isn't really fond of it's people "owning" things (riches are just on loan from Big Brother, temporarily), so their fat cats are hiding their winnings offshore, buying expensive things in places where China has no say.

Basically, the complaint is that our housing prices are going through the roof, for reasons that can't realistically be blamed on Chinese investors, but taking houses off the market certainly doesn't help the situation. Australia apparently just recently decided to get serious about stopping this practice, because they're the second biggest target in the world, after Vancouver. So now Vancouver's thinking about doing something about it. Investors should move in (not gonna happen until China's teat is sucked dry), rent the place out (too much effort), or pay a tax on empty buildings (Yay! Free money from a multi-millionaire! Let's have a show of hands. Who thinks we should take 50% of that tax dodger's money? Remember, he's not here so he can't see you vote, and he himself doesn't get a vote).
 
Also there are no statistics on foreign investment, and politicians won't touch the issue.

There's plenty of anecdotal/circumstantial evidence which when combined make an interesting case:
-real estate agents going to China to sell properties over here
-marketing in Chinese and English
-Vancouver's mayor dating a Chinese woman whose mother was recently arrested on corruption charges
-developers dodging the issue lest they appear racist
-stories on Chinese corruption and their government tracking fugitives in Canada
-general housing affordability through the roof
-Vancouver having lower wages than other cities
-public resistance to any type of density. High-rise to replace single-family homes? Not in my Vancouver!
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
I think the mayor's dating life is a bit of a reach lol.

But yeah, soooo many empty apartments in prime real estate downtown because owners are unwilling to lower prices, either because they think the prices are a fair value estimate (lolyeahright, that bubble will burdt eventually) OR because they simply dont care about the apartment being occupied or not because it's not about income, but about owning/the money stashed overseas (hello Chinese investors)
 
The Patullo bridge finally set to be closed in mid-2016 to start the new upgrade.

382.gif

Good. I don't know how anybody can feel safe driving on that thing, the one trip I took on it this year skeeved me out.

Then again, anytime I have to go into New West, it's either at the Queensborough bridge, or it's on Skytrain.
 

ameratsu

Member
This was posted in another thread, but seems pretty relevant to some recent discussion in here so I'll share.

The most expensive housing market in North America is not where you’d think. It’s not New York City or Orange County, California, but Vancouver, British Columbia.

Vancouver isn’t an obvious superstar. It’s not home to a major industry—as New York and London are to finance, or San Francisco to tech—and it doesn’t have the cultural cachet of Paris or Milan. Instead, Vancouver’s appeal consists of comfort and security, making it what Andy Yan calls a “hedge city.”
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
Yeah that sounds about right.

If the housing bubble bursts I'll be so happy

a) CAD will go down, meaning my investments will go up
b) I might actually be the perfect age to buy a house, AND buy it for cheap!
 

Leeness

Member
Apparently.

This makes me so sad. I know so many people who were born Canadian citizens but have immigrant parents who can now have their citizenship taken away if they step out of line.

:/
 
Apparently.

This makes me so sad. I know so many people who were born Canadian citizens but have immigrant parents who can now have their citizenship taken away if they step out of line.

:/

Hey, Harper has gotta fulfill his 'ze terrorists are inside the country!' masturbatory wet dreams.

Still, it goes to show how much of a joke our country has become under him.
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
Apparently.

This makes me so sad. I know so many people who were born Canadian citizens but have immigrant parents who can now have their citizenship taken away if they step out of line.

:/

I'm applying for permanent residency and double citizenship later, this fucks me over in the most realest sense
 

Leeness

Member
Hey, Harper has gotta fulfill his 'ze terrorists are inside the country!' masturbatory wet dreams.

Still, it goes to show how much of a joke our country has become under him.

Yep...

Thinking about it now, I think this makes possibly half of my extended family, and my dad, second class citizens.

I'm applying for permanent residency and double citizenship later, this fucks me over in the most realest sense

You'll never be a real Canadian, Smiley. :( Sorry.

I suppose you can become a permanent resident, but if you commit a crime and Canada feels like they don't want you anymore, we'll just deport you, judge doesn't need to be seen, just GTFO.
 

Smiley90

Stop shitting on my team. Start shitting on my finger.
Yep...

Thinking about it now, I think this makes possibly half of my extended family, and my dad, second class citizens.



You'll never be a real Canadian, Smiley. :( Sorry.

I suppose you can become a permanent resident, but if you commit a crime and Canada feels like they don't want you anymore, we'll just deport you, judge doesn't need to be seen, just GTFO.

well I can become a citizen even! with a canadian passport and all!

... and then I'll get deported 20 years from now because of something. Or so. For now it's just terrorism and treason but.... we'll see.
 

Leeness

Member
well I can become a citizen even! with a canadian passport and all!

... and then I'll get deported 20 years from now because of something. Or so. For now it's just terrorism and treason but.... we'll see.

"For now."

Maybe it will get struck down now that it's in effect, because this seems like it could be a violation of the Charter. I should go look.
 

Harusame

Member
Is anyone planning on going to the Pokemon Symphonic Evolutions that is occurring on July 22nd or going to attend the Sony E3 experience this coming Monday at Tinseltown?
 
J

Jotamide

Unconfirmed Member
Is anyone planning on going to the Pokemon Symphonic Evolutions that is occurring on July 22nd or going to attend the Sony E3 experience this coming Monday at Tinseltown?
Going to Pokemon Symphony but not the E3 showing.
 

Dazzler

Member
plenty of media trucks outside waterfront this morning, guess they're covering the fallout from the skytrain meltdown yesterday
 
Is anyone planning on going to the Pokemon Symphonic Evolutions that is occurring on July 22nd or going to attend the Sony E3 experience this coming Monday at Tinseltown?
I'm going to the Pokemon Symphony! Super stoked about it!! :)

plenty of media trucks outside waterfront this morning, guess they're covering the fallout from the skytrain meltdown yesterday

Yeah that was a wreck yesterday. Thank god I was home before that all went down LOL!
 
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