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The article cites well grounded aggregate statistics. Eastern Oregon doesn't affect the statistics because not enough people live there. So Eastern Oregon and a

The article cites well grounded aggregate statistics. Eastern Oregon doesn't affect the statistics because not enough people live there. So Eastern Oregon and all the other very low population places are a red herring. Please argue with the points presented not some other issue entirely. Drum specifically calls out the high cost cities. But the aggregate statistics show that these are exceptions to the general pattern. We should not argue from our personal experience when the statistics show it is not typical. This is policy relevant. If the Feds are going to intervene, it is very important that they intervene in the actual problem, not some misunderstood version of the problem where intervention would be at best a waste of resources and political capital, and at worst further proof that "government intervention is always bad." A question with potentially constructive answers: "What federal interventions would potentially be helpful given that the housing crisis is mainly in a few high-rent cities?"

helen___keller 7y ago
>The article cites well grounded aggregate statistics. That's the problem, it's in aggregate when the problem is very localized. The nation is producing a ton of high paying jobs but only in places where rent and property values are skyrocketing, which is in a tiny sliver of American cities. That's the problem and why aggregate statistics will never capture the problem. My wife works in biotech. I work in tech. A year back we asked ourselves if we wanted to move to the mid sized American city where my parents live. Homes are very affordable there and if we had children, we could raise them near my extended family. One factor in choosing not to move is that there's only one employer in the entire metropolitan region that hires in her specialty of biotech. I would have to take a pay cut or work remotely, which I'm okay with, but we might be totally ending her career altogether which we are less okay with. So instead we're now renting at 3500 a month (3 bedrooms) and saving up for the enormous downpay we will need in greater Boston >A question with potentially constructive answers: "What federal interventions would potentially be helpful given that the housing crisis is mainly in a few high-rent cities?" Parent already offers an answer, tell states to end exclusionary zoning or lose federal transit/highway funding. Exclusionary zoning is born out of a dark period of American policymaking (redlining) so personally I'm on board
- ZeroGravitas 7y ago
  Something this reply chain suggested to my brain: If the hyper concentration is part of the problem, then won't forcing SF or other popular hubs to build high rise just make them even more popular and further increase the gravitational pull that will send another wave of migrants from the 2nd tier cities and we just repeat the same cycle with higher buildings? Isnt this the same as making streets wider because of traffic? Now even more people decide to drive.
  - coryrc 7y ago
    That's what Tokyo is; increasing in population despite Japan as a whole falling. People in cities have smaller greenhouse gas emissions than people living rural or suburbs; they don't need cars because things are close and mass transit is affordable and convenient because there are enough people sharing it. The US can't get there until they enforce standards of conduct in the public sphere and stop exclusionary zoning.
  - helen___keller 7y ago
    >forcing SF or other popular hubs to build high rise Just a note but I find it highly disingenuous to conflate eliminating restrictive zoning with mandating high-rises. Eliminating restrictive zoning is just allowing the free market to better utilize land, which may mean high rises, or it may mean tightly packed townhouses or single family homes like in many Japanese suburbs, and only where the demand exists. If you own a standard American SFH, nobody is forcing you to demolish it. >just make them even more popular and further increase the gravitational pull that will send another wave of migrants from the 2nd tier cities and we just repeat the same cycle with higher buildings? Absolutely, without a doubt. There's a limit (globally it seems to be around a population of 30 million in the metropolitan region), but there's no doubt that if market forces brought reasonable prices to the Bay area at the very least the gentrified and priced out would return, those who fled to the exurbs and drive in for 70+ minutes would return, and at the very least a bunch of techies in other cities who could never imagine paying 3600 on a single bedroom would give the Bay area a try. Essentially, the region would likely boom much in the way that New York boomed in the industrial revolution, or more recently Shanghai and Beijing boomed. Whether you view this as positive is obviously debatable but I find it undeniably fair that we stop stacking the deck in favor of the rich and landed
pizzazzaro 7y ago
Looking at the glut of empty affordable housing in Oregon, compared to the mass of homeless people encamped behind a San Francisco Home Depot? I'm gonna have to call your red herring comment irrelevant to the evidence. If it were only Oregon, that'd fly. But we have nearly everywhere in the country that's more than 1-2 hours' travel from a major metropolitan area. While we can discount some farmland, there's a fracked-land house I can sell you in Ohio for as little as $5K, $10K tops. The only internet available is dial-up. The planned $150/month 10Mbit-down/1Mbit-up cable internet deal for the county with Comcast fell through back in '11. The only water is well-water - and you'll have to pay more for a filter system than for the house. The power company will charge you more than a mortgage payment to keep the place surviveably warm in the winter. And the only jobs? The Walmart closed back in '11. And being from out of town isnt gonna help. But if you're nice to a guy I met at the Denny's about 40 mins from the place, he can get you $8/hour at the Walmart distribution center 90 minutes away on the highway. Food? There's a Dollar Store about 20 minutes down the road at "downtown." There's a gas station, a McDonalds, and a couple of pawn shops and antique dealers that are effectively interchangeable - that's where you can buy "farnature" if you cant build your own from cord-wood that you buy from neighboring farms. And a gun store that popped back up after the Walmart closed. And the one church left, where the whole town will expect you. And the bar, called "bar's". If you hear chanting on one Saturday night of the month, accompanied by faint light from the woods out back, that's just the Klan rally where the locals go to blame immigrants and African Americans for taxes still existing. Local Government has effectively collapsed from lack of funding. But the county Sheriff gets to use "Civil Asset Forfeiture" on unwary travellers to put his kids through boarding school. The house itself? Is a shotgun shack. From the way you talk about people, I expect you have currently closets this size. If the fridge and stove still work, they're still from the 70s. The place probably would have been condemned if the 5-county inspector handn't passed on about five years back. But hey, its almost the cheapest house in America. Its been on the market since before the housing collapse.

helen___keller 7y ago

>The article cites well grounded aggregate statistics. That's the problem, it's in aggregate when the problem is very localized. The nation is producing a ton of high paying jobs but only in places where rent and property values are skyrocketing, which is in a tiny sliver of American cities. That's the problem and why aggregate statistics will never capture the problem. My wife works in biotech. I work in tech. A year back we asked ourselves if we wanted to move to the mid sized American city where my parents live. Homes are very affordable there and if we had children, we could raise them near my extended family. One factor in choosing not to move is that there's only one employer in the entire metropolitan region that hires in her specialty of biotech. I would have to take a pay cut or work remotely, which I'm okay with, but we might be totally ending her career altogether which we are less okay with. So instead we're now renting at 3500 a month (3 bedrooms) and saving up for the enormous downpay we will need in greater Boston >A question with potentially constructive answers: "What federal interventions would potentially be helpful given that the housing crisis is mainly in a few high-rent cities?" Parent already offers an answer, tell states to end exclusionary zoning or lose federal transit/highway funding. Exclusionary zoning is born out of a dark period of American policymaking (redlining) so personally I'm on board

ZeroGravitas 7y ago
Something this reply chain suggested to my brain: If the hyper concentration is part of the problem, then won't forcing SF or other popular hubs to build high rise just make them even more popular and further increase the gravitational pull that will send another wave of migrants from the 2nd tier cities and we just repeat the same cycle with higher buildings? Isnt this the same as making streets wider because of traffic? Now even more people decide to drive.
- coryrc 7y ago
  That's what Tokyo is; increasing in population despite Japan as a whole falling. People in cities have smaller greenhouse gas emissions than people living rural or suburbs; they don't need cars because things are close and mass transit is affordable and convenient because there are enough people sharing it. The US can't get there until they enforce standards of conduct in the public sphere and stop exclusionary zoning.
- helen___keller 7y ago
  >forcing SF or other popular hubs to build high rise Just a note but I find it highly disingenuous to conflate eliminating restrictive zoning with mandating high-rises. Eliminating restrictive zoning is just allowing the free market to better utilize land, which may mean high rises, or it may mean tightly packed townhouses or single family homes like in many Japanese suburbs, and only where the demand exists. If you own a standard American SFH, nobody is forcing you to demolish it. >just make them even more popular and further increase the gravitational pull that will send another wave of migrants from the 2nd tier cities and we just repeat the same cycle with higher buildings? Absolutely, without a doubt. There's a limit (globally it seems to be around a population of 30 million in the metropolitan region), but there's no doubt that if market forces brought reasonable prices to the Bay area at the very least the gentrified and priced out would return, those who fled to the exurbs and drive in for 70+ minutes would return, and at the very least a bunch of techies in other cities who could never imagine paying 3600 on a single bedroom would give the Bay area a try. Essentially, the region would likely boom much in the way that New York boomed in the industrial revolution, or more recently Shanghai and Beijing boomed. Whether you view this as positive is obviously debatable but I find it undeniably fair that we stop stacking the deck in favor of the rich and landed

pizzazzaro 7y ago

Looking at the glut of empty affordable housing in Oregon, compared to the mass of homeless people encamped behind a San Francisco Home Depot? I'm gonna have to call your red herring comment irrelevant to the evidence. If it were only Oregon, that'd fly. But we have nearly everywhere in the country that's more than 1-2 hours' travel from a major metropolitan area. While we can discount some farmland, there's a fracked-land house I can sell you in Ohio for as little as $5K, $10K tops. The only internet available is dial-up. The planned $150/month 10Mbit-down/1Mbit-up cable internet deal for the county with Comcast fell through back in '11. The only water is well-water - and you'll have to pay more for a filter system than for the house. The power company will charge you more than a mortgage payment to keep the place surviveably warm in the winter. And the only jobs? The Walmart closed back in '11. And being from out of town isnt gonna help. But if you're nice to a guy I met at the Denny's about 40 mins from the place, he can get you $8/hour at the Walmart distribution center 90 minutes away on the highway. Food? There's a Dollar Store about 20 minutes down the road at "downtown." There's a gas station, a McDonalds, and a couple of pawn shops and antique dealers that are effectively interchangeable - that's where you can buy "farnature" if you cant build your own from cord-wood that you buy from neighboring farms. And a gun store that popped back up after the Walmart closed. And the one church left, where the whole town will expect you. And the bar, called "bar's". If you hear chanting on one Saturday night of the month, accompanied by faint light from the woods out back, that's just the Klan rally where the locals go to blame immigrants and African Americans for taxes still existing. Local Government has effectively collapsed from lack of funding. But the county Sheriff gets to use "Civil Asset Forfeiture" on unwary travellers to put his kids through boarding school. The house itself? Is a shotgun shack. From the way you talk about people, I expect you have currently closets this size. If the fridge and stove still work, they're still from the 70s. The place probably would have been condemned if the 5-county inspector handn't passed on about five years back. But hey, its almost the cheapest house in America. Its been on the market since before the housing collapse.