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I feel that the problem is that too many people want to live in Berlin, the solution is for a large fraction of those people to choose to live elsewhere, and th
by seunosewa 7y ago
I feel that the problem is that too many people want to live in Berlin, the solution is for a large fraction of those people to choose to live elsewhere, and the rising rents would have been a good way to achieve that outcome.
- xg15 7y agoWell, in that case, either the rent lock will actually work - or it will increase the difficulty for everyone to get a flat, which essentially would have the same effect of driving people to the outskirts.
- seunosewa 7y agoThe people who can afford to pay higher rents are generally the most productive. They have important skills that employers are willing to pay high salaries for. They also pay more taxes and spend more money. If I ran a city, I would want more of those highly skilled workers in my city.
- nerfhammer 7y agoSo, you're actually in favor of higher rents. Why not mandate rent increases?
- llampx 7y agoThis is silly. Your counter-argument is basically also meddling in the market.
- fzeroracer 7y agoThere is no such thing as not meddling in the market, because people that move to cities will work to enact policies to ensure that they can continue to either live in those cities or grow their own property value. In SF it swung hard in favor of landlords with the outcome of it being unaffordable for tenants and anyone except the ultra rich. Berlin seems to be swinging in the opposite direction and is attempting to fix things for tenants. And realistically, anyone not taking action to secure their home or investment would be considered an irrational actor by any free market standard.
- nerfhammer 7y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reductio_ad_absurdum
- pessimizer 7y ago> If I ran a city, I would want more of those highly skilled workers in my city. Why, exactly? Does the person who runs the city with the highest per capita tax receipts get some sort of award? I assume his/her rent would get driven up with the rest.
- DocTomoe 7y agoPeople with higher capita tax receipts are also less likely to be ill, less likely to indulge in violent crime, less likely to hold extremist views, less likely to litter or cause other trouble. If you want to manage a liveable city instead of a slum, you want that kind of people.
- fzeroracer 7y agoThat is exactly what happened with San Francisco though. Then those fraction of people in Berlin become entrenched in local politics, prevent any further housing or development and the end result is a city that's nigh-unlivable. Last I checked, SF gets a lot of criticism for that reason.
- pessimizer 7y agoAnother way to do it would be to turn new entrants away, unless people who were already there chose to leave. To the people living in Berlin, it's arguably not at all a problem that too many people want to live in Berlin until the rents rise as a result.
- DocTomoe 7y agoOr we could just limit rent rises and allow rent contracts to be limited to 5 years. After all, why does anyone have a higher "right" to live in their preferred place?