4 ms·

The free market is just you and me deciding what we want to buy or not. What you want is the politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money beca

The free market is just you and me deciding what we want to buy or not. What you want is the politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money because we are not smart enough to make free choices, which is the argument behind every single dictatorship.

dragontamer 10y ago
Zoning laws are increasingly local however. At some point, its no longer "Politicians over in Washington" and your own darn neighbors who are attending HOA meetings, deciding to ban Airbnb locally. A huge part of neighborhood local politics is the ability to push out "poor" people to certain corners. Single-family home dwellers don't like apartments or townhomes closeby. Not only are they "unsightly", they are filled with "lower class people" and "bring down home values". (often: codewords for browner and otherwise "less white" people) But its important to realize that this phenomenon is NOT top-down, but instead bubbles up from the bottom up. The people who think this are your neighbors down the street.
- emodendroket 10y ago
  I won't say those motivations are nonexistent, but having a bunch of unknown short-term people coming for a stay in a neighborhood makes it less like an actual neighborhood (who cares if I make a mess and do a half-assed job cleaning up?) and a temptation to turn housing into lucrative rentals squeezes housing stock in places where it's already constrained.
  - dragontamer 10y ago
    Fair point. That's also a local concern (and more legitimate). Although I need to remind people that in a democracy, its about the number of people who think a certain thought... not the legitimacy of those thoughts that count.
  - xapata 10y ago
    Then regulate what you dislike: making a mess, being loud, etc. Or do you want to ban motorcycles because some riders have too-loud mufflers?
    - emodendroket 10y ago
      Which one of these things do you think is easier to enforce? Would you prefer to have to call the police with a noise complaint regularly or not have noise in the first place?
      - xapata 10y ago
        I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted. Perhaps just knowing the rules might avoid the issue. After all, that's how you expect any AirBnB regulation to take effect.
        dragontamer 10y ago
        > I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted. How about a simple law: don't violate zoning regulations. Its no different than in the "good ol days" when you weren't allowed to run a Bed-and-Breakfast Inn out of your own home (unless you lived in a commercial district, or otherwise lived in a district with more lax Zoning laws)
        xapata 10y ago
        I prefer living in a district with lax zoning laws. They're always much more enjoyable.
        dragontamer 10y ago
        Not everyone has the mobility to move around towns. People gotta plant themselves somewhere and start working with the local politics of the towns that they live in. Which might be even encouraged by proper zoning laws. Long-term tenants may become more interested in local politics (the efficacy of local schools, security, and local decisions). Even those who are more economically mobile should be "good citizens" and participate in local decisions. Carrying on with that: for those who have little-to-no economic mobility (and there's plenty of them), Zoning Regulations and how their local neighborhoods act and work are incredibly important.
emodendroket 10y ago
What benefits you or me individually can easily be detrimental if we all start doing it, even if we take as a given your (in my opinion incorrect) assumption that in an unfettered free market there aren't some actors far more powerful than others.
electricEmu 10y ago
Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests. What you want is for corporations to decide what we can and cannot do with our money because we are not smart enough to make free choices, which is the argument behind every single corporation. Companies do not exist for altruistic purposes. They exist to make a handy profit for the fee at the expensive of many sometimes. Regulation extends a more fair playing field in some cases. Sometimes it protects the public interest. It's why there's no Walmart in Seattle.
- iplaw 10y ago
  The problem is, people still inexplicably think that they are delegating this representation to people who actually care or who are bound by some type of moral code which mandates acting in the person's best interests. How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary?
  - ceejayoz 10y ago
    > How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary? Probably the fact that there's strong evidence to support it? Compare today versus the 1970s in air quality, car safety, waterway pollution, etc.
- patrickaljord 10y ago
  > Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests. Is there a way to opt out? Otherwise it sounds more like coercion than delegating. Corporations are not made of martians, they are made of people making free choices. Should they get a special status with limited liability protected by the government? I don't think so but that's something to blame on the government, not corporations. If your neighbor's airbnb ruins your nights you should be able to sue and the owner of the building should be free to ban airbnb. But the government deciding that airbnb should be illegal or regulated centrally is where I draw the line.
  - 10y ago
ceejayoz 10y ago
> ... we are not smart enough to make free choices... You say that like it's not true, but history has borne that out pretty well. Humans are great at ignoring externalities, impacts on minority groups, etc.
zebrafish 10y ago
Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money. What we want is a free market with a check on human greed. For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of peoples lives/livelihoods? No. Therefore, I believe there should be regulation in the "free market".
- iplaw 10y ago
  > Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money. This seems like an essentially true statement, but a substantial majority of evidence points to the contrary.
- freeflight 10y ago
  >For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of people's lives/livelihoods? No. Sorry for being nitpicky, but wouldn't that second group of people also "profit" from cheap energy, ect. because they are also part of "all people"? Then what is so inherently wrong about that situation? If ALL of us can be living a little bit better by SOME of us sacrificing, then isn't that what we should be doing, at least in a somewhat "equal" measure? Guess I'm just channeling my inner Spock a tad bit too much ;)
  - emodendroket 10y ago
    Your Inner Spock might determine that it's Highly Illogical to only look at cheap transportation and not consider externalities like pollution.

dragontamer 10y ago

Zoning laws are increasingly local however. At some point, its no longer "Politicians over in Washington" and your own darn neighbors who are attending HOA meetings, deciding to ban Airbnb locally. A huge part of neighborhood local politics is the ability to push out "poor" people to certain corners. Single-family home dwellers don't like apartments or townhomes closeby. Not only are they "unsightly", they are filled with "lower class people" and "bring down home values". (often: codewords for browner and otherwise "less white" people) But its important to realize that this phenomenon is NOT top-down, but instead bubbles up from the bottom up. The people who think this are your neighbors down the street.

emodendroket 10y ago
I won't say those motivations are nonexistent, but having a bunch of unknown short-term people coming for a stay in a neighborhood makes it less like an actual neighborhood (who cares if I make a mess and do a half-assed job cleaning up?) and a temptation to turn housing into lucrative rentals squeezes housing stock in places where it's already constrained.
- dragontamer 10y ago
  Fair point. That's also a local concern (and more legitimate). Although I need to remind people that in a democracy, its about the number of people who think a certain thought... not the legitimacy of those thoughts that count.
- xapata 10y ago
  Then regulate what you dislike: making a mess, being loud, etc. Or do you want to ban motorcycles because some riders have too-loud mufflers?
  - emodendroket 10y ago
    Which one of these things do you think is easier to enforce? Would you prefer to have to call the police with a noise complaint regularly or not have noise in the first place?
    - xapata 10y ago
      I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted. Perhaps just knowing the rules might avoid the issue. After all, that's how you expect any AirBnB regulation to take effect.
      - dragontamer 10y ago
        > I think that the AirBnB host will be careful about what guests are permitted after the first noise complaint, risking being evicted. How about a simple law: don't violate zoning regulations. Its no different than in the "good ol days" when you weren't allowed to run a Bed-and-Breakfast Inn out of your own home (unless you lived in a commercial district, or otherwise lived in a district with more lax Zoning laws)
        xapata 10y ago
        I prefer living in a district with lax zoning laws. They're always much more enjoyable.
        dragontamer 10y ago
        Not everyone has the mobility to move around towns. People gotta plant themselves somewhere and start working with the local politics of the towns that they live in. Which might be even encouraged by proper zoning laws. Long-term tenants may become more interested in local politics (the efficacy of local schools, security, and local decisions). Even those who are more economically mobile should be "good citizens" and participate in local decisions. Carrying on with that: for those who have little-to-no economic mobility (and there's plenty of them), Zoning Regulations and how their local neighborhoods act and work are incredibly important.

emodendroket 10y ago

What benefits you or me individually can easily be detrimental if we all start doing it, even if we take as a given your (in my opinion incorrect) assumption that in an unfettered free market there aren't some actors far more powerful than others.

electricEmu 10y ago

Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests. What you want is for corporations to decide what we can and cannot do with our money because we are not smart enough to make free choices, which is the argument behind every single corporation. Companies do not exist for altruistic purposes. They exist to make a handy profit for the fee at the expensive of many sometimes. Regulation extends a more fair playing field in some cases. Sometimes it protects the public interest. It's why there's no Walmart in Seattle.

iplaw 10y ago
The problem is, people still inexplicably think that they are delegating this representation to people who actually care or who are bound by some type of moral code which mandates acting in the person's best interests. How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary?
- ceejayoz 10y ago
  > How has this basic falsehood persisted for so long and in the face of such damning evidence to the contrary? Probably the fact that there's strong evidence to support it? Compare today versus the 1970s in air quality, car safety, waterway pollution, etc.
patrickaljord 10y ago
> Political regulation is just you and me delegating representation of interests. Is there a way to opt out? Otherwise it sounds more like coercion than delegating. Corporations are not made of martians, they are made of people making free choices. Should they get a special status with limited liability protected by the government? I don't think so but that's something to blame on the government, not corporations. If your neighbor's airbnb ruins your nights you should be able to sue and the owner of the building should be free to ban airbnb. But the government deciding that airbnb should be illegal or regulated centrally is where I draw the line.
- 10y ago

ceejayoz 10y ago

> ... we are not smart enough to make free choices... You say that like it's not true, but history has borne that out pretty well. Humans are great at ignoring externalities, impacts on minority groups, etc.

zebrafish 10y ago

Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money. What we want is a free market with a check on human greed. For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of peoples lives/livelihoods? No. Therefore, I believe there should be regulation in the "free market".

iplaw 10y ago
> Nobody wants politicians to decide what we can and cannot do with our money. This seems like an essentially true statement, but a substantial majority of evidence points to the contrary.
freeflight 10y ago
>For example, do I think all people deserve cheap energy, personal transportation, and inexpensive plastic products? Yes. Do I think they deserve them at the expense of millions of people's lives/livelihoods? No. Sorry for being nitpicky, but wouldn't that second group of people also "profit" from cheap energy, ect. because they are also part of "all people"? Then what is so inherently wrong about that situation? If ALL of us can be living a little bit better by SOME of us sacrificing, then isn't that what we should be doing, at least in a somewhat "equal" measure? Guess I'm just channeling my inner Spock a tad bit too much ;)
- emodendroket 10y ago
  Your Inner Spock might determine that it's Highly Illogical to only look at cheap transportation and not consider externalities like pollution.