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‘Poor doors’ are just a natural consequence of putting social housing where it doesn’t belong. Making social housing more luxurious isn’t solving any real prob

‘Poor doors’ are just a natural consequence of putting social housing where it doesn’t belong. Making social housing more luxurious isn’t solving any real problems. Tax the luxury developments more and spend that money on social housing in a reasonable location instead.

insomniacity 7y ago
Where does social housing belong then? Where rich people can't see it? Society benefits greatly from mixed areas - race, class, etc.
- vwdhx 7y ago
  >Society benefits greatly from mixed areas - race, class, etc. Citation needed. Also If I buy a flat and I have to live with problematic people, how does that benefit me?
  - crooked-v 7y ago
    Forcing rich people to have exposure to poor people to not automatically equate "poor" with "problematic" is one benefit to society.
    - vwdhx 7y ago
      I'm not rich by any measure but I know the kind of people who receive social housing. Not saying they are all problematic but many of them are, and one bad neighbour is enough to make your life hell.
      - madaxe_again 7y ago
        You don’t know the kind of people who receive social housing, and it shows.
        deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
        wwdhx 7y ago
        I do, because I live surrounded by social housing blocks. And just last week they were lighting a campfire inside their building. After many years you can't imagine the things I've seen. Maybe it's you who doesn't know the kind of people who receive social housing.
        madaxe_again 7y ago
        You used the wrong sock puppet, vwdhx.
      - Freestyler_3 7y ago
        I agree with you, all the neighborhoods with social housing have thrash laying around, more crime (or general unsafe feeling) I know because I was living in the middle of it all in social housing. The problematic people live there their whole life, making their behavior the standard.
- ryanlol 7y ago
  Social housing belongs where the prices are reasonable, i.e. mostly not in central London luxury developments. We’re talking about the most desirable areas in the world here, trying to force in social housing is just weird. It’s not like there isn’t a bunch of places within a very reasonable commute where they could put social housing. Fuck, I used to commute from Reading for a while!
  - KUcxrAVrtI 7y ago
    There is nowhere in the west where housing is affordable. In the UK you have to go to the Scotish mountains to find houses that are as affordable today as London was in 1990.
  - madaxe_again 7y ago
    And how is somebody earning £60 a day going to pay for a £23/day commute, and housing on top of that, smartypants? Oh, right, taxpayer money. It’s almost like they’ve modelled this out before making it policy.
    - ryanlol 7y ago
      What exactly is wrong about using taxpayer money to subsidize those commutes? I think we should certainly impose heavier taxes on the luxury developments and the rich living in them.
      - xorcist 7y ago
        No taxpayer money is being spent. That's the whole point of this system, to avoid spending on housing benefits by utilizing price caps.
        ryanlol 7y ago
        Are the developers not taxpayers? No spending is avoided here, it’s merely obscured a little. Taxing the developers for straight cash would at least give the government more control on how it is spend.
- michaelt 7y ago
  Some people believe, instead of having social housing in ££££ areas with long waiting lists, we should have social housing in ££ areas with short waiting lists. And councils have finite budgets so every £ extra spent paying someone's rent is a £ that isn't spent on supporting and caring for the elderly and the disabled and the mentally ill / funding schools / running buses / maintaining cycle paths and parks and play areas and libraries. Unfortunately there are a number of disadvantages to this: 1. Making affordable housing a condition of planning permission doesn't cost the council anything, whereas houses built in other councils' areas would have to be paid for. 2. The vast majority of social housing users have jobs and loved ones. If someone has to buy a car to get to work, or can no longer get babysitting from their parents while they work, or moves somewhere with lower wages, such a move makes them poorer. 3. Many of the jobs these people are doing need doing anyway, so they'll have to be replaced - possibly with someone with a longer/more expensive commute. Some people have a certain cynicism about capitalism, and are sceptical as to whether these jobs' wages will rise at all, let alone rise enough to cover a more expensive commute. 4. Regeneration often involves demolishing homes poor people live in. As some minorities are richer than others, regeneration that sends poor people out of a city is also regeneration that sends certain minorities out of the city. Some people feel this has shades of "ethnic cleansing".
HelloNurse 7y ago
It can be argued that luxury homes don't belong in a densely populated city, and they should be moved to a "reasonable location". Low density makes the city a worse place for everyone.
- ryanlol 7y ago
  That seems rather obvious. “poor doors” are simply a much easier problem for politicians to use as a distraction.
madaxe_again 7y ago
The social housing in luxury high-rises is not luxurious. Where you might have two, four or eight units to a floor for private owners, social tenants are usually in much smaller units, 16 or 24 to a floor. The fit-out and finish tends to be “cheapest available”, and it shows. The layouts are often unbearably cramped, and windows are often smaller. Corridors are frequently left in an unfinished state - painted breeze-blocks and exposed utilities in the ceiling. So, to call this luxurious is to call anything above sleeping on a doorstep luxurious.
- ryanlol 7y ago
  >The social housing in luxury high-rises is not luxurious. It is, by the virtue of the location alone Complaining about the fit and finish just shows the mountain of privilege you’re standing on.
  - madaxe_again 7y ago
    Balderdash - unless you count “being able to work” as a luxury. Public transport in London is painfully expensive, and if you are earning minimum wage on a part-time contract, a private tenancy that would be affordable to such a person would be well outside of the city, and their commuting costs would be a substantial portion of their pay - and you would need to subsidise them to a greater degree than you would by simply having them live near their place of work. So, again, I assume you count having a job and a home as a “mountain of privilege”, and not as a fairly universal underpinning of society.

insomniacity 7y ago

Where does social housing belong then? Where rich people can't see it? Society benefits greatly from mixed areas - race, class, etc.

vwdhx 7y ago
>Society benefits greatly from mixed areas - race, class, etc. Citation needed. Also If I buy a flat and I have to live with problematic people, how does that benefit me?
- crooked-v 7y ago
  Forcing rich people to have exposure to poor people to not automatically equate "poor" with "problematic" is one benefit to society.
  - vwdhx 7y ago
    I'm not rich by any measure but I know the kind of people who receive social housing. Not saying they are all problematic but many of them are, and one bad neighbour is enough to make your life hell.
    - madaxe_again 7y ago
      You don’t know the kind of people who receive social housing, and it shows.
      - deleted 7y ago
        [deleted]
      - wwdhx 7y ago
        I do, because I live surrounded by social housing blocks. And just last week they were lighting a campfire inside their building. After many years you can't imagine the things I've seen. Maybe it's you who doesn't know the kind of people who receive social housing.
        madaxe_again 7y ago
        You used the wrong sock puppet, vwdhx.
    - Freestyler_3 7y ago
      I agree with you, all the neighborhoods with social housing have thrash laying around, more crime (or general unsafe feeling) I know because I was living in the middle of it all in social housing. The problematic people live there their whole life, making their behavior the standard.
ryanlol 7y ago
Social housing belongs where the prices are reasonable, i.e. mostly not in central London luxury developments. We’re talking about the most desirable areas in the world here, trying to force in social housing is just weird. It’s not like there isn’t a bunch of places within a very reasonable commute where they could put social housing. Fuck, I used to commute from Reading for a while!
- KUcxrAVrtI 7y ago
  There is nowhere in the west where housing is affordable. In the UK you have to go to the Scotish mountains to find houses that are as affordable today as London was in 1990.
- madaxe_again 7y ago
  And how is somebody earning £60 a day going to pay for a £23/day commute, and housing on top of that, smartypants? Oh, right, taxpayer money. It’s almost like they’ve modelled this out before making it policy.
  - ryanlol 7y ago
    What exactly is wrong about using taxpayer money to subsidize those commutes? I think we should certainly impose heavier taxes on the luxury developments and the rich living in them.
    - xorcist 7y ago
      No taxpayer money is being spent. That's the whole point of this system, to avoid spending on housing benefits by utilizing price caps.
      - ryanlol 7y ago
        Are the developers not taxpayers? No spending is avoided here, it’s merely obscured a little. Taxing the developers for straight cash would at least give the government more control on how it is spend.
michaelt 7y ago
Some people believe, instead of having social housing in ££££ areas with long waiting lists, we should have social housing in ££ areas with short waiting lists. And councils have finite budgets so every £ extra spent paying someone's rent is a £ that isn't spent on supporting and caring for the elderly and the disabled and the mentally ill / funding schools / running buses / maintaining cycle paths and parks and play areas and libraries. Unfortunately there are a number of disadvantages to this: 1. Making affordable housing a condition of planning permission doesn't cost the council anything, whereas houses built in other councils' areas would have to be paid for. 2. The vast majority of social housing users have jobs and loved ones. If someone has to buy a car to get to work, or can no longer get babysitting from their parents while they work, or moves somewhere with lower wages, such a move makes them poorer. 3. Many of the jobs these people are doing need doing anyway, so they'll have to be replaced - possibly with someone with a longer/more expensive commute. Some people have a certain cynicism about capitalism, and are sceptical as to whether these jobs' wages will rise at all, let alone rise enough to cover a more expensive commute. 4. Regeneration often involves demolishing homes poor people live in. As some minorities are richer than others, regeneration that sends poor people out of a city is also regeneration that sends certain minorities out of the city. Some people feel this has shades of "ethnic cleansing".

HelloNurse 7y ago

It can be argued that luxury homes don't belong in a densely populated city, and they should be moved to a "reasonable location". Low density makes the city a worse place for everyone.

ryanlol 7y ago
That seems rather obvious. “poor doors” are simply a much easier problem for politicians to use as a distraction.

madaxe_again 7y ago

The social housing in luxury high-rises is not luxurious. Where you might have two, four or eight units to a floor for private owners, social tenants are usually in much smaller units, 16 or 24 to a floor. The fit-out and finish tends to be “cheapest available”, and it shows. The layouts are often unbearably cramped, and windows are often smaller. Corridors are frequently left in an unfinished state - painted breeze-blocks and exposed utilities in the ceiling. So, to call this luxurious is to call anything above sleeping on a doorstep luxurious.

ryanlol 7y ago
>The social housing in luxury high-rises is not luxurious. It is, by the virtue of the location alone Complaining about the fit and finish just shows the mountain of privilege you’re standing on.
- madaxe_again 7y ago
  Balderdash - unless you count “being able to work” as a luxury. Public transport in London is painfully expensive, and if you are earning minimum wage on a part-time contract, a private tenancy that would be affordable to such a person would be well outside of the city, and their commuting costs would be a substantial portion of their pay - and you would need to subsidise them to a greater degree than you would by simply having them live near their place of work. So, again, I assume you count having a job and a home as a “mountain of privilege”, and not as a fairly universal underpinning of society.