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Are you suggesting that anyone who wants to should be permitted to build a house in Central Park? And that the "government" is unreasonable for preventing them

Are you suggesting that anyone who wants to should be permitted to build a house in Central Park? And that the "government" is unreasonable for preventing them from doing so?

djrobstep 8y ago
No, I'm saying that the problem isn't "supply", but that access to existing supply is violently (and unevenly) restricted. I'm interested in why you put government in quote marks. Do the cops who prevent people engaging in construction in Central Park not work for the government?
- CalRobert 8y ago
  Indeed. The descendants of people who occupied central park ca. 1600 might have thoughts on that.
  - masonic 8y ago
    Central Park didn't exist until 1857.
    - CalRobert 8y ago
      The land which became central park did.
      - masonic 8y ago
        Who are you suggesting lived there in 1600?
        CalRobert 8y ago
        The Wappinger confederacy most likely.
CalRobert 8y ago
No, but I do think it's worth exploring the idea of a commons once more. I suspect a not tiny percentage of the population might be better off with a low-overhead lifestyle that we've made extremely difficult with our model of land ownership. I respect property rights, which is why the more I learn the more our current system of selling the right to occupy land that was arbitrarily taken (from Irish and English farmers, from native Americans, or hell, even from Mexico) to be scaffolding designed to hide the fact the land was basically just stolen. Nevermind more recent outrages, like redlining.