7 ms·

Look, even if by some miracle, building permits are easier to get and more lenient; there’s a reason for “excluding people” and it’s not gatekeeping surplus hou

Look, even if by some miracle, building permits are easier to get and more lenient; there’s a reason for “excluding people” and it’s not gatekeeping surplus housing. Supply is just limited. It will always be too limited due to geography and other conditions. Ie the thing stopping people from living where they want is that there’s not enough places available to everyone. Regardless of the economic system used to distribute this finite resource (money, lotteries, etc...), no matter what the end result will be the same: not everyone will get housing. While there are a lot of nice things here, people mainly want to be here because of the jobs. If you help distribute the jobs via remoting, it will really help in reducing demand for very limited resources

epistasis 7y ago
There's more than enough space, there's tons of space that we need to make more dense with infill housing. This isn't just a social issue, it's also a climate issue. Even if we assume extremely ambitious goals of 100% EVs and 75% of energy from renewables in 2050, we need to drastically reduce the amount of vehicle miles traveled in California, which means denser housing with mixed uses. Right now that sort of necessary housing and business is illegal in most of the peninsula. We need to change that. It really is just gate-keeping to keep others out. Distributing jobs is not a solution, because sprawl is not a solution. We must make better use of existing land, rather than consuming more farmland or nature.
- chaostheory 7y ago
  I agree with improving inventory with dense housing. However, where I disagree is that it can meet availability for everyone who wants to live here both now AND in the future. Sure, we might be able to generate enough space in the near future assuming the NIMBYS start losing legal fights, but demand will almost always outstrip inventory unless your population and economy start shrinking. Remote work is still a good tool because it requires no extra upfront costs or slow to pass legislation; it can be done right now to offset demand of a scarce finite resource: living space. Moreover, it doesn't have to eat up new land. I would imagine it could help revitalize urban centers such as Detroit and other cities in the Rust Belt
  - epistasis 7y ago
    > but demand will almost always outstrip inventory unless your population and economy start shrinking. I don't know why this has to be the case. Can you expand upon the reasoning that makes you think this?
    - chaostheory 7y ago
      Populations keep growing and they are attracted by the jobs centralized in specific locations. Unfortunately, physical space both horizontal and vertical are limited. This isn’t some new revelation and it isn’t limited to just the US, nor is it some new phenomenon; it’s well known history. It’s a very old problem. The only thing new is remote work as an option
      - epistasis 7y ago
        But we are not limited by space in the Bay Area. Here's a couple different models of what building adequate housing would look like: https://medium.com/@firstcultural/how-california-can-build-3-5-million-new-homes-dfe2f0ba3466 https://medium.com/@firstcultural/how-california-can-build-3...
        chaostheory 7y ago
        I'm not really seeing this in the article unless I missed it. The plan calls for 3.5 million new homes. The problem is that the Bay Area alone will probably need approximately 2 million more homes in the coming decades. That doesn't include LA and other regions. Also, it's not just physical space that's a resource limit: there's also time (how fast can you build it?) and money (do builders have enough financing). This is with the optimistic assumption that NIMBY legislation doesn't get in the way, which is why I still feel that remote work is still the most ideal solution, since the only roadblock it has is company culture. I guess another solution is the route Palo Alto is taking: hinder or destroy the local economy to limit demand of physical space. I don't agree with this since only wealthy people can afford to deal with it.

epistasis 7y ago

There's more than enough space, there's tons of space that we need to make more dense with infill housing. This isn't just a social issue, it's also a climate issue. Even if we assume extremely ambitious goals of 100% EVs and 75% of energy from renewables in 2050, we need to drastically reduce the amount of vehicle miles traveled in California, which means denser housing with mixed uses. Right now that sort of necessary housing and business is illegal in most of the peninsula. We need to change that. It really is just gate-keeping to keep others out. Distributing jobs is not a solution, because sprawl is not a solution. We must make better use of existing land, rather than consuming more farmland or nature.

chaostheory 7y ago
I agree with improving inventory with dense housing. However, where I disagree is that it can meet availability for everyone who wants to live here both now AND in the future. Sure, we might be able to generate enough space in the near future assuming the NIMBYS start losing legal fights, but demand will almost always outstrip inventory unless your population and economy start shrinking. Remote work is still a good tool because it requires no extra upfront costs or slow to pass legislation; it can be done right now to offset demand of a scarce finite resource: living space. Moreover, it doesn't have to eat up new land. I would imagine it could help revitalize urban centers such as Detroit and other cities in the Rust Belt
- epistasis 7y ago
  > but demand will almost always outstrip inventory unless your population and economy start shrinking. I don't know why this has to be the case. Can you expand upon the reasoning that makes you think this?
  - chaostheory 7y ago
    Populations keep growing and they are attracted by the jobs centralized in specific locations. Unfortunately, physical space both horizontal and vertical are limited. This isn’t some new revelation and it isn’t limited to just the US, nor is it some new phenomenon; it’s well known history. It’s a very old problem. The only thing new is remote work as an option
    - epistasis 7y ago
      But we are not limited by space in the Bay Area. Here's a couple different models of what building adequate housing would look like: https://medium.com/@firstcultural/how-california-can-build-3-5-million-new-homes-dfe2f0ba3466 https://medium.com/@firstcultural/how-california-can-build-3...
      - chaostheory 7y ago
        I'm not really seeing this in the article unless I missed it. The plan calls for 3.5 million new homes. The problem is that the Bay Area alone will probably need approximately 2 million more homes in the coming decades. That doesn't include LA and other regions. Also, it's not just physical space that's a resource limit: there's also time (how fast can you build it?) and money (do builders have enough financing). This is with the optimistic assumption that NIMBY legislation doesn't get in the way, which is why I still feel that remote work is still the most ideal solution, since the only roadblock it has is company culture. I guess another solution is the route Palo Alto is taking: hinder or destroy the local economy to limit demand of physical space. I don't agree with this since only wealthy people can afford to deal with it.