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Neither food nor oil actually make your point, since both are heavily subsidized by the US government.
by pmiller2 7y ago
Neither food nor oil actually make your point, since both are heavily subsidized by the US government.
- fiter 7y agoBut surely they're not subsidized for the entire world by the US government?
- jlebar 7y agoTo refresh the point that I am making: OP said "Ruthless capitalism and fundamental human needs do not mix well." The implication being, housing should not be subject to ruthless capitalism. And I use the ready and cheap availability of food and oil as a counterargument. Your point seems to be that food and oil are beneficiaries of subsidies in the US, therefore are not "ruthless capitalism". The US government pays $20B/yr in farm subsidies. HUD has a budget of $40B, and the mortgage interest deduction is a $110B/yr subsidy to homeowners. If food in the US is subsidized such that it is not "ruthless capitalism", then on this basis it would seem to me that housing has been subsidized well beyond the point of "ruthless capitalism" as well. Yet OP (and you) seem to think that food is subsidized to a far greater degree than housing. I challenge you to make a concrete case that this is true, either in the US or globally in general.
- jlebar 7y agoI wrote Yet food is governed by ruthless capitalism, no? Surely we wouldn't argue that farm subsidies are all that's standing in the way between people getting a decent meal and chaos? Are you in fact arguing that US farm subsidies are all that's standing in the way between people getting a decent meal and chaos?