4 ms·

True, a model which predicts reality will in fact predict reality. I've never seen any evidence that your hypothesis is true, or even a model that would accoun

True, a model which predicts reality will in fact predict reality. I've never seen any evidence that your hypothesis is true, or even a model that would account for it, but I'm hardly an expert in the field. Assuming this is more than speculation/theoretical nitpicking, do you have citations on the effects you describe? If your theory is more than just idle speculation, this is a great way for non-racists to engage in house price arbitrage insofar as they wish to consume housing. Do you know of any neighborhoods in NYC where I can exploit this arbitrage?

dragonwriter 10y ago
> I've never seen any evidence that your hypothesis is true If the key element of it wasn't true at one point, blockbusting would never have been a viable strategy. If you want to present arguments that race relations have changed in enough since then that whites no longer prefer living without blacks in the immediate vincinity so that such neighborhoods command a price premium and diversity causes price declines, I'm prepared to examine your evidence. > If your theory is more than just idle speculation, this is a great way for non-racists to engage in house price arbitrage insofar as they wish to consume housing. If you mean "white non-racists can get cheaper housing by voluntarily choosing to live where black people live", that's been a well-known way for non-racist whites to optimize home affordability since at least when my parents were young adults in the 1960s. Of course, the downside in jurisdictions where there is a significant constituency of racist whites (which is, of course, any place where this strategy is particularly effective) is that non-racist whites then also get to experience the downside of the way racist whites distribute public services among different neighborhoods, which depending on personal utility functions may more than offset the value of the cost savings on the real estate itself. But, still, the strategy isn't new.
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  Blockbusting does not have to be caused by white people being non-neutral towards blacks. It can also be caused by white people, perhaps accurately, believing that the neighborhood will change in other undesirable ways (e.g. higher crime). Similarly, while I'm well aware of (and have practiced in the past) living in black neighborhoods to save money, it was not obviously a racial-arbitrage strategy. The neighborhoods I lived in were undesirable and cheap for a variety of reasons (reduced amenities, higher crime), and it's far from clear how much of a racial delta there was. I don't have any reason to believe that a low amenity, high crime, entirely white neighborhood would have had a different price. I always viewed it as a crime arbitrage strategy; being 6'6", somewhat muscular and wearing shoes with holes in them, I don't view myself as much of a crime target. So yes, I'd like to see evidence of either a) whites being non-neutral towards blacks in the statistical algorithms era (e.g. 1995+) and b) a statistical default or prepayment model that incorporates network effects of this sort (or anything mathematically similar). And incidentally, I'm asking about the networking model because it sounds super interesting. Insofar as network models are reliable enough to use in lending, I'd love to know about it. This would directly affect some of my work if I could port such models into the tech space.

dragonwriter 10y ago

> I've never seen any evidence that your hypothesis is true If the key element of it wasn't true at one point, blockbusting would never have been a viable strategy. If you want to present arguments that race relations have changed in enough since then that whites no longer prefer living without blacks in the immediate vincinity so that such neighborhoods command a price premium and diversity causes price declines, I'm prepared to examine your evidence. > If your theory is more than just idle speculation, this is a great way for non-racists to engage in house price arbitrage insofar as they wish to consume housing. If you mean "white non-racists can get cheaper housing by voluntarily choosing to live where black people live", that's been a well-known way for non-racist whites to optimize home affordability since at least when my parents were young adults in the 1960s. Of course, the downside in jurisdictions where there is a significant constituency of racist whites (which is, of course, any place where this strategy is particularly effective) is that non-racist whites then also get to experience the downside of the way racist whites distribute public services among different neighborhoods, which depending on personal utility functions may more than offset the value of the cost savings on the real estate itself. But, still, the strategy isn't new.

yummyfajitas 10y ago
Blockbusting does not have to be caused by white people being non-neutral towards blacks. It can also be caused by white people, perhaps accurately, believing that the neighborhood will change in other undesirable ways (e.g. higher crime). Similarly, while I'm well aware of (and have practiced in the past) living in black neighborhoods to save money, it was not obviously a racial-arbitrage strategy. The neighborhoods I lived in were undesirable and cheap for a variety of reasons (reduced amenities, higher crime), and it's far from clear how much of a racial delta there was. I don't have any reason to believe that a low amenity, high crime, entirely white neighborhood would have had a different price. I always viewed it as a crime arbitrage strategy; being 6'6", somewhat muscular and wearing shoes with holes in them, I don't view myself as much of a crime target. So yes, I'd like to see evidence of either a) whites being non-neutral towards blacks in the statistical algorithms era (e.g. 1995+) and b) a statistical default or prepayment model that incorporates network effects of this sort (or anything mathematically similar). And incidentally, I'm asking about the networking model because it sounds super interesting. Insofar as network models are reliable enough to use in lending, I'd love to know about it. This would directly affect some of my work if I could port such models into the tech space.