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"It's not how much you make. It's how much you keep." One of the things that tends to not enter these discussions is that the US has torn down about a million

"It's not how much you make. It's how much you keep." One of the things that tends to not enter these discussions is that the US has torn down about a million SROs[1] and largely zoned out of existence the ability to build other small scale homes currently being called Missing Middle Housing. When walkable neighborhoods were more the norm and you could get just a room or small place as market rate housing without having to go through some government program with long wait lists, you could live on not much money. Now a car is practically required to make life work in the US, housing is expensive as hell and then we argue about income and I get told by random internet strangers that the high cost of rent is irrelevant to discussions of homelessness, and never mind that studies contradict such claims. Meanwhile, housing costs and the fact that it's so hard to live without a car tends to not come up at all in discussions of this sort. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_room_occupancy

simfree 5y ago
Here in Seattle in the 2000s there was a huge push to tear down or repurpose all the motels along Aurora Avenue as they were viewed as promoting prostitution. Now, with many fewer motels we have shrank our pool of ultras affordable, unsubsidized housing and prostitutes just take their johns to the alleyways to do the deed.
- Analemma_ 5y ago
  I literally just drove southbound on Aurora about an hour ago and saw three street walkers between 160th and 80th so I think it’s safe to say that effort was a total failure.
  - CryptoPunk 5y ago
    The idea that reducing low quality housing raises quality of life is the same fallacy that's behind minimum wage prohibition. When you prohibit micro-units and other low-income/low-quality housing, you don't get more high quality housing. You get more homelessness. When you prohibit low-wage work, you don't get more high-paying jobs. You get more unemployment. The only process that actually increases the quantity of high quality housing and high paying jobs, is investment, and investment is motivated and sustained by investment profits, which left-wing populists demagogue so much about, and political leaders enact so many laws to inhibit (e.g. laws against price gouging, rent control, tax rates that progress with income, etc).
    - tonyedgecombe 5y ago
      >When you prohibit low-wage work, you don't get more high-paying jobs. You get more unemployment. That wasn't the experience of the UK when we introduced a minimum wage.
      - CryptoPunk 5y ago
        I mean ceteris paribus. There are numerous other factors that can counter-act the negative impact of price floors, so introducing a price floor, especially one that only affects on the order of 4% of the merchandise, as in the case of minimum wage, does not always correspond with a rise in un-used capacity (unemployment), let alone one that is profound.
      - asteroidbelt 5y ago
        What was the experience in the UK? I googled it, and seems like full time unemployment didn’t fall, but part time employment felt a little. Additionally I don’t know (didn’t find) what was the effective minimum wage before the min wage act. If it was already almost equal to min wage, the law was effectively no op. I.e. wages didn’t went up.
JJMcJ 5y ago
Also something you see in older cities, retail first floor, small apartments upper floors. Tended to be cheaper than all-residential buildings. There have been experiments with some buildings without any parking being put up but it's rare. And that adds a lot of expense.
- DoreenMichele 5y ago
  Thank you. Parking minimums are also proven to kill old style walkable downtowns with commercial on the first floor and residential above. You can't develop those old buildings and also meet parking minimums and preserve the dense development. In practice, you end up tearing down some of the buildings to meet those minimums and there is abundant parking that's half empty most of the time and it becomes a lot less walkable and more spread out, increasing the need for a car. It's maddening.
erentz 5y ago
Plug a good channel related to this called Not Just Bikes on YouTube. He does a great job tearing apart North American urban planning and housing and compares it to examples where the author currently lives in Europe. I want to be able to live in places like that but I’m stuck in the US. Here is an example where he also compares new planning to how we used to do it. These old compact suburbs that have become expensive because they’re incredibly desirable. Yet we don’t build like that now. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0
- stevenicr 5y ago
  Any idea what the historical price of sidewalks was? My search engine foo isn't turning up much before 2007. I've been wondering how the nice sidewalk / walking / biking places I've enjoyed were built.. was it super cheap in the 80s and skyrocketed since? I've gone down the rabbit hole of semi-current pricing for sidewalks being built and road expansion in this mid-size city - and it's just dumb that a sidewalk install can easily cost a million dollars for a block or two for example. I can't imagine building neighborhoods today that mimic what I miss from the past in another state - but there's no way it cost that much to build back then either I'm fairly certain.
  - dotandgtfo 5y ago
    On my phone so can't check but this may be covered by the aforementioned Not just bikes youtube series on Strong Towns, I strongly recommend checking it out. IIRC the initial price of building roads and sidewalks was invested by the federal government at favorable terms on the condition that maintenance was covered by the municipal government. This worked great for the first 20-30 years until maintenance costs started to increase greatly towards the end of life of the infrastructure. The central theme of this series is that municipalities and towns have entered a debt trap and are relying on future growth to cover historical infrastructure debt. My explanation may be wrong, inaccurate, or not relevant for your question so I'd recommend checking out his videos if this seems interesting.
throwawaysea 5y ago
I'm not sure why so many people in this comment section dislike cars. To most people they are a benefit, not a burden. Cars let you have fast point to point travel on your own terms, with no waiting times, no dealing with crimes/harassment, protection from weather, the ability to transport cargo/other people, and the freedom to go where you want. I personally love parking minimums and the availability of street parking spaces because they enable this system of direct travel from door to door. It means I am able to lose less time to transit and live a richer life as a result of having fast access to all those destinations. Not all cities have to be the same or follow the same urbanist dictate. People are varied, and carry different preferences. It's OK for some places to elect to have parking minimums and build infrastructure, community, and lifestyle that is car-centric. And as for costs of living - I don't think it is fair to say that zoning is to blame. Zoning is a choice by a community to preserve the lifestyle and neighborhood character they have built, and there's nothing wrong with that. Yes it may be inconvenient for potential new residents, but so what - local government logically should serve its current residents. I don't think that's particularly selfish, since we could just as well ask those seeking out low cost living to be realistic about their options and live within their means. Why is anyone entitled to live wherever they want at whatever cost they want? If someone can't afford to live in San Francisco or other such high demand high cost location, they are just as free to seek out a lower-cost life elsewhere. America has no shortage of places where one can make a living and thrive. Sure those locations may not have the exact job someone wants or the amenities they want or whatever else - but that's life - you don't get everything you want, and expecting otherwise feels like the dictionary definition of entitlement.
- tacitusarc 5y ago
  Municipal government rarely serves its citizens. Instead, it bows to the will of an entrenched bureaucracy which optimizes, above all else, the form of self-continuation requiring the lowest amount of effort possible. If you have ever dealt with city government in any capacity, you know how little power the elected representatives have when compared with the lifelong bureaucrats. Also, if you don’t think it’s a travesty when someone is forced out of their ancestral home because gentrification raises property taxes and they have a low income, you’re kind of heartless.
- 5y ago
anm89 5y ago
Jacobin's credibility is about on par with info wars.

simfree 5y ago

Here in Seattle in the 2000s there was a huge push to tear down or repurpose all the motels along Aurora Avenue as they were viewed as promoting prostitution. Now, with many fewer motels we have shrank our pool of ultras affordable, unsubsidized housing and prostitutes just take their johns to the alleyways to do the deed.

Analemma_ 5y ago
I literally just drove southbound on Aurora about an hour ago and saw three street walkers between 160th and 80th so I think it’s safe to say that effort was a total failure.
- CryptoPunk 5y ago
  The idea that reducing low quality housing raises quality of life is the same fallacy that's behind minimum wage prohibition. When you prohibit micro-units and other low-income/low-quality housing, you don't get more high quality housing. You get more homelessness. When you prohibit low-wage work, you don't get more high-paying jobs. You get more unemployment. The only process that actually increases the quantity of high quality housing and high paying jobs, is investment, and investment is motivated and sustained by investment profits, which left-wing populists demagogue so much about, and political leaders enact so many laws to inhibit (e.g. laws against price gouging, rent control, tax rates that progress with income, etc).
  - tonyedgecombe 5y ago
    >When you prohibit low-wage work, you don't get more high-paying jobs. You get more unemployment. That wasn't the experience of the UK when we introduced a minimum wage.
    - CryptoPunk 5y ago
      I mean ceteris paribus. There are numerous other factors that can counter-act the negative impact of price floors, so introducing a price floor, especially one that only affects on the order of 4% of the merchandise, as in the case of minimum wage, does not always correspond with a rise in un-used capacity (unemployment), let alone one that is profound.
    - asteroidbelt 5y ago
      What was the experience in the UK? I googled it, and seems like full time unemployment didn’t fall, but part time employment felt a little. Additionally I don’t know (didn’t find) what was the effective minimum wage before the min wage act. If it was already almost equal to min wage, the law was effectively no op. I.e. wages didn’t went up.

JJMcJ 5y ago

Also something you see in older cities, retail first floor, small apartments upper floors. Tended to be cheaper than all-residential buildings. There have been experiments with some buildings without any parking being put up but it's rare. And that adds a lot of expense.

DoreenMichele 5y ago
Thank you. Parking minimums are also proven to kill old style walkable downtowns with commercial on the first floor and residential above. You can't develop those old buildings and also meet parking minimums and preserve the dense development. In practice, you end up tearing down some of the buildings to meet those minimums and there is abundant parking that's half empty most of the time and it becomes a lot less walkable and more spread out, increasing the need for a car. It's maddening.

erentz 5y ago

Plug a good channel related to this called Not Just Bikes on YouTube. He does a great job tearing apart North American urban planning and housing and compares it to examples where the author currently lives in Europe. I want to be able to live in places like that but I’m stuck in the US. Here is an example where he also compares new planning to how we used to do it. These old compact suburbs that have become expensive because they’re incredibly desirable. Yet we don’t build like that now. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MWsGBRdK2N0

stevenicr 5y ago
Any idea what the historical price of sidewalks was? My search engine foo isn't turning up much before 2007. I've been wondering how the nice sidewalk / walking / biking places I've enjoyed were built.. was it super cheap in the 80s and skyrocketed since? I've gone down the rabbit hole of semi-current pricing for sidewalks being built and road expansion in this mid-size city - and it's just dumb that a sidewalk install can easily cost a million dollars for a block or two for example. I can't imagine building neighborhoods today that mimic what I miss from the past in another state - but there's no way it cost that much to build back then either I'm fairly certain.
- dotandgtfo 5y ago
  On my phone so can't check but this may be covered by the aforementioned Not just bikes youtube series on Strong Towns, I strongly recommend checking it out. IIRC the initial price of building roads and sidewalks was invested by the federal government at favorable terms on the condition that maintenance was covered by the municipal government. This worked great for the first 20-30 years until maintenance costs started to increase greatly towards the end of life of the infrastructure. The central theme of this series is that municipalities and towns have entered a debt trap and are relying on future growth to cover historical infrastructure debt. My explanation may be wrong, inaccurate, or not relevant for your question so I'd recommend checking out his videos if this seems interesting.

throwawaysea 5y ago

I'm not sure why so many people in this comment section dislike cars. To most people they are a benefit, not a burden. Cars let you have fast point to point travel on your own terms, with no waiting times, no dealing with crimes/harassment, protection from weather, the ability to transport cargo/other people, and the freedom to go where you want. I personally love parking minimums and the availability of street parking spaces because they enable this system of direct travel from door to door. It means I am able to lose less time to transit and live a richer life as a result of having fast access to all those destinations. Not all cities have to be the same or follow the same urbanist dictate. People are varied, and carry different preferences. It's OK for some places to elect to have parking minimums and build infrastructure, community, and lifestyle that is car-centric. And as for costs of living - I don't think it is fair to say that zoning is to blame. Zoning is a choice by a community to preserve the lifestyle and neighborhood character they have built, and there's nothing wrong with that. Yes it may be inconvenient for potential new residents, but so what - local government logically should serve its current residents. I don't think that's particularly selfish, since we could just as well ask those seeking out low cost living to be realistic about their options and live within their means. Why is anyone entitled to live wherever they want at whatever cost they want? If someone can't afford to live in San Francisco or other such high demand high cost location, they are just as free to seek out a lower-cost life elsewhere. America has no shortage of places where one can make a living and thrive. Sure those locations may not have the exact job someone wants or the amenities they want or whatever else - but that's life - you don't get everything you want, and expecting otherwise feels like the dictionary definition of entitlement.

tacitusarc 5y ago
Municipal government rarely serves its citizens. Instead, it bows to the will of an entrenched bureaucracy which optimizes, above all else, the form of self-continuation requiring the lowest amount of effort possible. If you have ever dealt with city government in any capacity, you know how little power the elected representatives have when compared with the lifelong bureaucrats. Also, if you don’t think it’s a travesty when someone is forced out of their ancestral home because gentrification raises property taxes and they have a low income, you’re kind of heartless.
5y ago

anm89 5y ago

Jacobin's credibility is about on par with info wars.