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My "millionaire" grandma in the middle of San Francisco would literally die from those options. She is fragile due to age. Her house is familiar to her. Familia

My "millionaire" grandma in the middle of San Francisco would literally die from those options. She is fragile due to age. Her house is familiar to her. Familiarity reduces stress, confusion, and accidents. She is close to family. She will die soon enough. You can wait. Better yet, you can do what she did many decades ago. Get a house built on undesirable land, then be part of a community that makes the value go up. The home you now covet is only valuable because of people like her. Nothing stops you from doing likewise. Pick some crummy land out in Mississippi or West Virginia and create a community.

gkop 6y ago
Had it not been for the distortion of prop 13, your grandma would have been incentivized to move long ago. We can roll-back prop 13 going forward for properties purchased some buffer of time after the new law goes into effect, without harming your grandma.
- zepto 6y ago
  Why force her out? Why don’t you go somewhere where prices are cheaper and make a nice community there?
  - gkop 6y ago
    I didn't say force. I said incentivize. Society benefits from incentivizing her to move, so that more humans can occupy the space she is currently occupying, which will improve regional productivity, reduce highway and transit overcrowding, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, all sorts of good stuff. If her property taxes aren't artificially constrained by prop 13, she'll see her taxes go up over time, and decide how much she values staying in the house and paying the increasing taxes, versus retiring sooner or investing her resources in other areas of her life. The market at work. Also, ideally we wouldn't simply remove prop 13, but replace it with a better, progressive-not-regressive tax code, eg. allowing homeowners of limited means to defer portions of their property taxes until the sale of their property. This would make it easy for grandma to stay put, and be vastly more fair and healthy for society than the status quo. > Why don’t you go somewhere where prices are cheaper and make a nice community there? Would you rephrase this in a kinder way please?
    - zepto 6y ago
      > I didn't say force. I said incentivize. Incentivize usually means offering something to someone to make something attractive. That is not what you are proposing. You are proposing to take away her money by force until she can’t afford to live there. > If her property taxes aren't artificially constrained by prop 13 Taxes that rise based on a tax inspector estimating the value of an unsold property are at least as artificial as taxing based on transactions. There is nothing ‘natural’ about property taxes. It’s a system constructed and imposed by the local government. > she'll see her taxes go up over time Yes, through no fault of her own, if and only if other people continue to drive up prices. > and decide how much she values staying in the house and paying the increasing taxes Agreed. If other people drive up the price, they’ll be able to force her out of her home. > Society benefits from incentivizing her to move, so that more humans can occupy the space she is currently occupying, which will improve regional productivity, reduce highway and transit overcrowding, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, all sorts of good stuff. A kinder way would be - why force grandma to move, when not doing so would bring all of these benefits to areas which need them more, and frankly, have better incentives in the form of currently lower costs?
  - imtringued 6y ago
    Why don't you stop building more commercial real estate if you don't like it that people move to your community? For people with poor means money is everything. Lots of people come to your community and become what you call "rich" in the process because the jobs are in your community.
caturopath 6y ago
> My "millionaire" grandma in the middle of San Francisco would literally die from those options. I don't see why (2) or (4) would affect her lifestyle much. > Better yet, you can do what she did many decades ago. Get a house built on undesirable land, then be part of a community that makes the value go up. The home you now covet is only valuable because of people like her. Nothing stops you from doing likewise. Pick some crummy land out in Mississippi or West Virginia and create a community. I don't follow any of this. I don't understand why this viewpoint would mean it makes sense that people who have made tons of money should contribute less of it to their societies. Winning by taking from others ain't the goal. When new people arrive, they should be getting the same deal from the government you are, not getting hosed because they're less established. (Obviously your prescience is rewarded: you made tons of money on your house.)
- zepto 6y ago
  > Winning by taking from others ain't the goal. When new people arrive, they should be getting the same deal from the government you are, not getting hosed because they're less established. But that’s just it - they do get the same deal. Everyone pays the same percentage of what their house cost when they buy it. Grandma got the same deal you do. If you buy a house now, it too will be worth more if you wait 30 years. You just have to wait as long as grandma did. That is literally the same deal.
  - caturopath 6y ago
    You literally described giving established people a better deal than ones who are less established. > If you buy a house now, it too will be worth more if you wait 30 years. It might be. Or I might have bought it in Redding or Vicksburg and pay tax on the market value, same as my neighbors who buy today. Prop 13 only kicks in meaningfully for people who basically won the lottery, in proportion to their gains. To do that, it distorts the market, adding friction to what is already a market with unhealthily-high friction.
    - zepto 6y ago
      No, I literally described giving people the same deal. Grandma wasn’t ‘established’ when she moved in. She had exactly the same deal you have. Grandma already paid her taxes and now you want to force her out of her home. Have properties in Redding or Vicksburg not appreciated in the last 30 years? > Prop 13 only kicks in meaningfully for people who basically won the lottery You keep saying ‘won the lottery’, when what you mean is they bought a property in a place where properties appreciated in value. That just sounds like a good investment decision.
imtringued 6y ago
And you will inherit her tax rate? Is this really the good end of the story?

gkop 6y ago

Had it not been for the distortion of prop 13, your grandma would have been incentivized to move long ago. We can roll-back prop 13 going forward for properties purchased some buffer of time after the new law goes into effect, without harming your grandma.

zepto 6y ago
Why force her out? Why don’t you go somewhere where prices are cheaper and make a nice community there?
- gkop 6y ago
  I didn't say force. I said incentivize. Society benefits from incentivizing her to move, so that more humans can occupy the space she is currently occupying, which will improve regional productivity, reduce highway and transit overcrowding, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, all sorts of good stuff. If her property taxes aren't artificially constrained by prop 13, she'll see her taxes go up over time, and decide how much she values staying in the house and paying the increasing taxes, versus retiring sooner or investing her resources in other areas of her life. The market at work. Also, ideally we wouldn't simply remove prop 13, but replace it with a better, progressive-not-regressive tax code, eg. allowing homeowners of limited means to defer portions of their property taxes until the sale of their property. This would make it easy for grandma to stay put, and be vastly more fair and healthy for society than the status quo. > Why don’t you go somewhere where prices are cheaper and make a nice community there? Would you rephrase this in a kinder way please?
  - zepto 6y ago
    > I didn't say force. I said incentivize. Incentivize usually means offering something to someone to make something attractive. That is not what you are proposing. You are proposing to take away her money by force until she can’t afford to live there. > If her property taxes aren't artificially constrained by prop 13 Taxes that rise based on a tax inspector estimating the value of an unsold property are at least as artificial as taxing based on transactions. There is nothing ‘natural’ about property taxes. It’s a system constructed and imposed by the local government. > she'll see her taxes go up over time Yes, through no fault of her own, if and only if other people continue to drive up prices. > and decide how much she values staying in the house and paying the increasing taxes Agreed. If other people drive up the price, they’ll be able to force her out of her home. > Society benefits from incentivizing her to move, so that more humans can occupy the space she is currently occupying, which will improve regional productivity, reduce highway and transit overcrowding, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, all sorts of good stuff. A kinder way would be - why force grandma to move, when not doing so would bring all of these benefits to areas which need them more, and frankly, have better incentives in the form of currently lower costs?
- imtringued 6y ago
  Why don't you stop building more commercial real estate if you don't like it that people move to your community? For people with poor means money is everything. Lots of people come to your community and become what you call "rich" in the process because the jobs are in your community.

caturopath 6y ago

> My "millionaire" grandma in the middle of San Francisco would literally die from those options. I don't see why (2) or (4) would affect her lifestyle much. > Better yet, you can do what she did many decades ago. Get a house built on undesirable land, then be part of a community that makes the value go up. The home you now covet is only valuable because of people like her. Nothing stops you from doing likewise. Pick some crummy land out in Mississippi or West Virginia and create a community. I don't follow any of this. I don't understand why this viewpoint would mean it makes sense that people who have made tons of money should contribute less of it to their societies. Winning by taking from others ain't the goal. When new people arrive, they should be getting the same deal from the government you are, not getting hosed because they're less established. (Obviously your prescience is rewarded: you made tons of money on your house.)

zepto 6y ago
> Winning by taking from others ain't the goal. When new people arrive, they should be getting the same deal from the government you are, not getting hosed because they're less established. But that’s just it - they do get the same deal. Everyone pays the same percentage of what their house cost when they buy it. Grandma got the same deal you do. If you buy a house now, it too will be worth more if you wait 30 years. You just have to wait as long as grandma did. That is literally the same deal.
- caturopath 6y ago
  You literally described giving established people a better deal than ones who are less established. > If you buy a house now, it too will be worth more if you wait 30 years. It might be. Or I might have bought it in Redding or Vicksburg and pay tax on the market value, same as my neighbors who buy today. Prop 13 only kicks in meaningfully for people who basically won the lottery, in proportion to their gains. To do that, it distorts the market, adding friction to what is already a market with unhealthily-high friction.
  - zepto 6y ago
    No, I literally described giving people the same deal. Grandma wasn’t ‘established’ when she moved in. She had exactly the same deal you have. Grandma already paid her taxes and now you want to force her out of her home. Have properties in Redding or Vicksburg not appreciated in the last 30 years? > Prop 13 only kicks in meaningfully for people who basically won the lottery You keep saying ‘won the lottery’, when what you mean is they bought a property in a place where properties appreciated in value. That just sounds like a good investment decision.

imtringued 6y ago

And you will inherit her tax rate? Is this really the good end of the story?