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> Great! Now go tear down the entire housing stock so we can rebuild it better. Unfortunately, as a society we're already under-building, so we can't really aff

> Great! Now go tear down the entire housing stock so we can rebuild it better. Unfortunately, as a society we're already under-building, so we can't really afford to tear down what we've already got. Well, why not? Japan effectively rebuilt its entire housing stock few times over since WW2, and so did Britain, Germany, and ex-Union countries. I believe USA has more money than the broke USSR did 20 year timelines is easily achievable for USA as a wealthy, and still relatively industrialised country.

chmod775 6y ago
>I believe USA has more money than the broke USSR did Note that this doesn't really matter. It especially didn't matter back then in a less globalized economy. The USSR being poor doesn't change anything about their domestic labor pool, which is what is relevant for construction work. The laborers simply charge less. This is same fallacy that leads people to believe we'd magically have more of everything if money hoarded by rich people was distributed across the populace. At best stuff will be distributed better. But bakers won't start baking more bread, nor will car manufacturers be able to start making more cars. Assuming unemployment stays the same, the economic output of goods won't change. Money doesn't produce anything, people do. Money is a tool to guide labor in the right direction and distribute goods. Which means that in order to build more, the USA would either need more construction workers or become more efficient at constructing stuff. The first can be achieved by diverting money and making the job more attractive, the second by creating a competitive environment.
- baybal2 6y ago
  What else do you propose American workers to produce? More cat video websites? I simply don't see anything much profitable left for USA to produce. No more expensive stuff left to make.
  - chmod775 6y ago
    You probably wrote this before I added the last paragraph to my comment.
- imtringued 6y ago
  >The first can be achieved by diverting money and making the job more attractive You mean... like the central bank dropping interest rates to an all time low? The low CPI inflation also suggests an underutilized labor force.
zbrozek 6y ago
I think money is actually the problem. In a rich country everyone can afford to have opinions about other folks' business, and so we spend years approving projects that take months to complete. Japan has (as far as I can tell as a distant observer) much stronger property rights with regard to what you can build than most of America.

chmod775 6y ago

>I believe USA has more money than the broke USSR did Note that this doesn't really matter. It especially didn't matter back then in a less globalized economy. The USSR being poor doesn't change anything about their domestic labor pool, which is what is relevant for construction work. The laborers simply charge less. This is same fallacy that leads people to believe we'd magically have more of everything if money hoarded by rich people was distributed across the populace. At best stuff will be distributed better. But bakers won't start baking more bread, nor will car manufacturers be able to start making more cars. Assuming unemployment stays the same, the economic output of goods won't change. Money doesn't produce anything, people do. Money is a tool to guide labor in the right direction and distribute goods. Which means that in order to build more, the USA would either need more construction workers or become more efficient at constructing stuff. The first can be achieved by diverting money and making the job more attractive, the second by creating a competitive environment.

baybal2 6y ago
What else do you propose American workers to produce? More cat video websites? I simply don't see anything much profitable left for USA to produce. No more expensive stuff left to make.
- chmod775 6y ago
  You probably wrote this before I added the last paragraph to my comment.
imtringued 6y ago
>The first can be achieved by diverting money and making the job more attractive You mean... like the central bank dropping interest rates to an all time low? The low CPI inflation also suggests an underutilized labor force.

zbrozek 6y ago

I think money is actually the problem. In a rich country everyone can afford to have opinions about other folks' business, and so we spend years approving projects that take months to complete. Japan has (as far as I can tell as a distant observer) much stronger property rights with regard to what you can build than most of America.