http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-rutten26apr26%2C0%2C4968177.column

My comment is based on my eight years work in the construction industry here in New York City. I don’t have a better source than that. Anyone with data (or experence) that confirms or disproves my experience can post it, and we will have a conversation going. That’s how blogs work. I don’t have to wait until I have a thoroughly-vetted, professional quality piece of journalism in order to post my thoughts.

By the same token, my posted throughts don’t carry the same presumptive credibility that a published article in a major media institution like the NYT does. Journalists are one of the many professions in the U.S. that involve work for a profit AND have ethical standard enforced through self-regulation. Doctors and lawyers are not all that different, although their self-regulation is a bit more formalized. Working for a profit and having ethical standards are not mutually exclusive.

The press isn’t called the “fourth estate” for nothing–it has a responsibility to the public ethically report the information it gathers. In dischargint that reponsibility there is wide latitude for difference based on viewpoint–I don’t pretend there is a single “objective” way to report a story.

Frankly I think the NYT article on Brodsky probably falls just within the range of reasonable, though the editorial tone that emerges in the middle may be a bit beyond the pale. My critique of the myth of the Flatbush carpenter was not a critique of the NYT for having published it so much as a critique of the concept itself, as advanced by Brodsky during the CP battle and apparently in conenction with this article.

But Jan falls down at the end by juxtaposing Ben’s plea for “real data” with an isolated quote from BicyclesOnly. This is just an arbitrary assemblage of pasted material and it’s typical of the smoke-and-mirrors methods that both Brodsky and Jan have used in the past.

It is a falsity to expect media to report both sides. Media doesn’t have to do so. The sooner this is understood the less respect you’ll have for media. Its a business, like Wal-Mart or a green, green bike shop. Someone opened the business (started the newspaper) to reap a reward. They did start the biz to be fair.

Nonprofits are in a different class but not necessarily free of the same issues.

To address the original article, quote “it’s easy to impart made-up motivations to imaginary characters, but how about citing some real data?”

Fine. But here’s the response in one post, typical of many: “Oh, and by the way, 9 times out of 10 it is the contractor, not some poor carpenter working for an hourly wage, who brings the tools to a job site.” Is this the “real data” that you write of? Because this is the kind of stuff I see on here ad naseum.

Oh, and by the way, 9 times out of 10 it is the contractor, not some poor carpenter working for an hourly wage, who brings the tools to a job site. If a carpenter has contracted his or her own job and is bringing the tools, let’s be honest and say “contractor.” They undoubtedly will be passing their costs, including their driving and parking costs, along to the customer.

Reporters love human interest stories and conflict.

Well, but that’s my point. They didn’t talk to any real poor people who would have had to pay more. All of the actual human-interest stories I read were:

(a) people who could easily have paid more
(b) businesspeople who would have saved more than $8 from lower congestion

There were ZERO examples of actual wage-earners below the median income who drove to Manhattan on weekdays. Zero.

Reporters could have focused on the people in LIC who currently are swamped with bridge traffic – but that would have required making a connection between toll-shopping and congestion pricing. They could have talked to people who would have gotten dedicated bus lanes into the city – but that would have required making a connection between congestion pricing and transit funding. They could have figured out how much a car-less family pays in taxes to maintain the bridges they don’t use, but that would have required making a connection between congestion pricing and bridge funding. No, let’s keep it simple: some “poor” schmuck is going to have to pay $8 a day.