6 ms·

U.S. Supreme Court ends CDC's pandemic residential eviction moratorium

49 points by arkadiyt 5y ago

gillytech 5y ago
While this is interesting, it strains credulity that this article has a place on HN...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- kelnos 5y ago
  Please avoid posting these sorts of comments. Per the site guidelines: > Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it. [...] If you flag, please don't also comment that you did.
  - gillytech 5y ago
    I really should read those guidelines in full one day.
    - dang 5y ago
      Please!
      - gillytech 5y ago
        Done.
    - atatatat 5y ago
      It was one of the first things I did, and honestly, large part of what makes HN a special place.
    - effingwewt 5y ago
      This reminded me to do my every-so-often re-read of them
gillytech 5y ago
Weighing in on this, I'd say the counterarguments to keeping the moratorium in place are absolutely absurd. I'd like to see hard evidence that "a surge of evictions could lead to more infections of the coronavirus". I'm happy to see the Supreme Court finally coming out of it's post election turtle shell and doing it's job.
- refurb 5y ago
  This was the old “interstate commerce” argument - growing extra crops for my own consumption ripples through the supply chain and impacts interstate commerce… basically a CDC power grab. Glad it was struck down.
- tehjoker 5y ago
  It doesn't make sense that having people have their own space as opposed to crowded homeless shelters, increased density at friends/family's places, or on the streets unable to wash or maintain yourself regularly could lead to disease?
  - gillytech 5y ago
    I said I'd like to see hard evidence. When one intends to make a financial proposal at a company, they should expect to furnish evidence that the expenditure would provide some kind of return and that there is a factual basis for the need of whatever it is the money is being spent on.
    - klyrs 5y ago
      > I said I'd like to see hard evidence. ... which we can't get without a live test. And then a localized test wouldn't be enough data. So we need to see massive suffering before we can follow common sense. Meanwhile, billions of dollars in rental assistance remain undispersed.
      - nverno 5y ago
        There must be some data, or at least people knowledgeable about, how often eviction actually leads to homelessness, and how corona has spread amongst homeless. For instance, I was evicted once, but I didn't end up homeless on the street. I would guess this is pretty common for evictions- people have to move someplace cheaper or back in with friends or family temporarily. I think some suffering alleviated now is likely just being postponed in another form (common among social welfare programs imo). The moratorium isn't sustainable in the long run and will discourage people from renting/maintaining property leading to less housing eventually.
luckylion 5y ago
> Liberal Justice Stephen Breyer said in a dissenting opinion that the outcome of the case was not as clear cut as the majority suggested and that the court was not justified in ending the moratorium so quickly at a time when COVID-19 cases are surging. > "The public interest strongly favors respecting the CDC’s judgment at this moment, when over 90 percent of counties are experiencing high transmission rates," Breyer wrote. When courts want to make political decisions, not judicial ones.
- bawolff 5y ago
  That doesn't seem political. Weighing whether an infringement of personal rights have a legitament purpose and are justified is the court's job. The "public good" is a huge part of that calculus Edit: as an aside, the upvotes/downvotes on this post are wild. One moment its +3 the next moment its -3.
  - chrisco255 5y ago
    No, it's not. "Public good" is some evolving, tenuous, emotional standard, not a legal definition. If you want to renegotiate property law, we have a branch for that: your state's legislature.
  - babesh 5y ago
    Read the Constitution. It limits powers even when it is in the so called public interest.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    > Weighing whether an infringement of personal rights have a legitament purpose and are justified is the court's job. No it's not; the court's job is to determine if the matter brought before them is legal and constitutional or not. It's Congress' job to decide where the line between property rights and the public interest is. While I'm very much in favor of an eviction moratorium right now, it does feel like the CDC exceeded their legal authority here.
- draw_down 5y ago
  Get used to it my friend, that ship sailed long ago. The court effects changes elected officials are too timid to effect themselves (to say nothing of whether those changes are good or bad). It is a site of politics. The court is why gay people can get married in our country, to pick but one example.
EGreg 5y ago
A nation of homeless people or increase in housing insecurity would be worse for the economy, wouldn’t it? And the effective IQ would drop as well… This is a case where enforcing private property rights has a negative effect on the economy, while a UBI would have a positive effect. It runs counter to the free-market theories for the same reason as abolishing debtors’ prisons in favor of bankruptcy protections and limited liability companies increases people’s ability to take entrepreneurial risks.
- gillytech 5y ago
  And paying people's rent for them is somehow good for the economy? I have been seeing a lot of headlines lately about how it's incredibly difficult to find workers as economies are reopening. If one has a job, they should be able to pay rent, in theory. This super-welfare scenario we have been in for the past 1 1/2 years can't possibly continue. What's good for the economy is the exchange of goods and services produced by the people that make up said economy.
  - totesraunch 5y ago
    And people can't survive on slave wages. The people running the country (USA) are out of touch with the current reality many people live in. This isn't the ,1950s where a part time job can sustain anyone.
    - gillytech 5y ago
      I hear you, and I agree that there are definitely problems with wages in this country. But the thing to really understand is that the value of money is the collective value of the goods and services exchanged in the economy. It's really just that simple. You need to produce, personally, real value in order to get enough money to acquire the services of another (room and board of some kind). There are exceptions to this rule of course (stock market, currency market and commodities speculators, looking at you). Think about this long and hard and anyone can see the connections between value traded for value. This is why a free market is the best possible solution to a large economy. When government gets involved, their authoritarian solutions (take money from one person and give it to another, without the exchange of true value) will never have long term workability. If someone wants to work a minimum wage job in America, they should not expect to be able to acquire luxury goods or anything of great value other than being able to subsist. It's nothing against them, it's just that the value being provided by the worker is not generally that valuable. This is in itself a UBI of sorts. Nobody inherently has the right to simply take from another (food, shelter, healthcare) simply for being alive and providing nothing in return. But showing up to a job and clocking in and clocking out every day, and doing one's job will bring in some return and you can then go out and exchange that for survival needs. Now if you want to live a little better you're going to want to provide more value than is expected and you will get more return on that. A simple example is waiting tips. I have definitely tipped bigger for service people who put in extra value. And above all else, morale and general happiness of a culture goes up when people are producing and exchanging HIGH VALUE. This is not the economy taught in schools. "Economics" as a subject has been mired down so thoroughly in complexity, trapdoors and dead ends nobody can agree on anything, and socialism and communism emerge as great concepts. It's just that "nobody has quite implemented socialism [which is communism] correctly" and thus resulted in untold suffering, misery and death throughout the ages. If communism is so great then why do so many people flee socialist and communist countries and try to make it to the USA? Because we have a FREE MARKET. Not total government appropriations and grants, yet.
gumby 5y ago
I think the landlords will rue this decision. Yes, some will be able to turf out a tenant and replace them with a higher paying one, and those landlords will be glad. But many will not be able to; now, instead getting the rent check from the government,* they will get nothing. Yes, the hiring market is hot, but only for certain sectors. Others, for example service sectors servicing office staff, have yet to recover. And the realtor association: they just want transaction volume: each eviction, they hope, will generate a future commission event. For the reasons above: I doubt it. * though the government has been derelict so far in making these payments.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  > * though the government has been derelict so far in making these payments. So why would landlords prefer a program which pays no money? Better to be rid of the tenant to at least reduce wear and tear.
  - gumby 5y ago
    The money has been allocated, payment has been slow. Which is both in law and in practice different from “pays no money”. This is like the first round of COVID support forgivable loans: didn’t manage to start up right away. Now it won’t be available at all.
    - babesh 5y ago
      Even if you assume that the money will come, you would have lost the opportunity cost of the money. Also in the meantime, if you had a mortgage on the property, you would have to make up that income on your own which is a double opportunity cost. In the meantime, inflation is running over 5%. If you look at SF apartments, you will see many landlords who are selling at what seem to be low prices. Of course, SF and the surrounding Bay Area are affected by remote work as well. It doesn't seem to be a good time to be a landlord in this area?
  - bawolff 5y ago
    Tennants who can't pay also probably are less respectful of the property. Not like they have any money to lose if they wreck the place.
MattGaiser 5y ago
Why exactly are so many people not paying rent between the enhanced amount of unemployment that was given out and the labor shortage and rising wages that come with that? Who is this population of people who are not paying and why? Did a lot not manage to get unemployment benefits in the first place? Are landlords evicting tenants who owe back rent even if they are paying now? Is it just a matter of waiting for school to start up again so they can work?
- csomar 5y ago
  Are you asking why the law was put in the first place. You are living in a bubble where you (and your family/friends) respect your obligations. Surprise, most of society doesn't.
  - sparrish 5y ago
    It wasn't a law. The Supreme Court says it was an illegal executive action.
- anovikov 5y ago
  For the absolutely stupid reason: they aren't paying because they can.
  - MattGaiser 5y ago
    That is what I am trying to figure out. Are there actually millions of people unable to pay or do they just see this as an easy way to have more money and get housing for free? A friend of a friend did this though. Went from $0 to 6 figures in assets just by investing his rent money as he kept his job.
    - malwarebytess 5y ago
      Renters still owe. If their 'tenants' have any money to collect, like your friend of a friend, they certainly can be got to. Most people do not have the money.
SamPatt 5y ago
> "The public interest strongly favors respecting the CDC’s judgment at this moment, when over 90 percent of counties are experiencing high transmission rates," Breyer wrote. I wonder if the Supreme Court doing their job and weighing in on the legality of executive branch actions is also in the public interest?
- loxias 5y ago
  > I wonder if the Supreme Court doing their job and weighing in on the legality of executive branch actions is also in the public interest? Apparently not.
- detaro 5y ago
  ... he comments under the Supreme Court doing exactly that. (and yes, a justice having a different opinion is part of that, and no, he didn't just say that public interest overrides, but specifically argues why he thinks the modified moratorium could be legal. But cherry-picking quotes is fun I guess)
  - SamPatt 5y ago
    The dissenting opinion is relevant. Judges making policy from the bench is an age old issue.
    - detaro 5y ago
      Yes, and I'm pointing out that the dissenting opinion is weighing in on the legality of it, you just choose a quote that's not about that part.
- dehrmann 5y ago
  It's been a year and a half. The emergency justifications are gone, so it's time for congress to act. It's the judicial branch's job to act as a check on the power of the executive branch.
  - AnimalMuppet 5y ago

49 points by arkadiyt 5y ago

gillytech 5y ago

While this is interesting, it strains credulity that this article has a place on HN...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
kelnos 5y ago
Please avoid posting these sorts of comments. Per the site guidelines: > Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it. [...] If you flag, please don't also comment that you did.
- gillytech 5y ago
  I really should read those guidelines in full one day.
  - dang 5y ago
    Please!
    - gillytech 5y ago
      Done.
  - atatatat 5y ago
    It was one of the first things I did, and honestly, large part of what makes HN a special place.
  - effingwewt 5y ago
    This reminded me to do my every-so-often re-read of them

gillytech 5y ago

Weighing in on this, I'd say the counterarguments to keeping the moratorium in place are absolutely absurd. I'd like to see hard evidence that "a surge of evictions could lead to more infections of the coronavirus". I'm happy to see the Supreme Court finally coming out of it's post election turtle shell and doing it's job.

refurb 5y ago
This was the old “interstate commerce” argument - growing extra crops for my own consumption ripples through the supply chain and impacts interstate commerce… basically a CDC power grab. Glad it was struck down.
tehjoker 5y ago
It doesn't make sense that having people have their own space as opposed to crowded homeless shelters, increased density at friends/family's places, or on the streets unable to wash or maintain yourself regularly could lead to disease?
- gillytech 5y ago
  I said I'd like to see hard evidence. When one intends to make a financial proposal at a company, they should expect to furnish evidence that the expenditure would provide some kind of return and that there is a factual basis for the need of whatever it is the money is being spent on.
  - klyrs 5y ago
    > I said I'd like to see hard evidence. ... which we can't get without a live test. And then a localized test wouldn't be enough data. So we need to see massive suffering before we can follow common sense. Meanwhile, billions of dollars in rental assistance remain undispersed.
    - nverno 5y ago
      There must be some data, or at least people knowledgeable about, how often eviction actually leads to homelessness, and how corona has spread amongst homeless. For instance, I was evicted once, but I didn't end up homeless on the street. I would guess this is pretty common for evictions- people have to move someplace cheaper or back in with friends or family temporarily. I think some suffering alleviated now is likely just being postponed in another form (common among social welfare programs imo). The moratorium isn't sustainable in the long run and will discourage people from renting/maintaining property leading to less housing eventually.

luckylion 5y ago

> Liberal Justice Stephen Breyer said in a dissenting opinion that the outcome of the case was not as clear cut as the majority suggested and that the court was not justified in ending the moratorium so quickly at a time when COVID-19 cases are surging. > "The public interest strongly favors respecting the CDC’s judgment at this moment, when over 90 percent of counties are experiencing high transmission rates," Breyer wrote. When courts want to make political decisions, not judicial ones.

bawolff 5y ago
That doesn't seem political. Weighing whether an infringement of personal rights have a legitament purpose and are justified is the court's job. The "public good" is a huge part of that calculus Edit: as an aside, the upvotes/downvotes on this post are wild. One moment its +3 the next moment its -3.
- chrisco255 5y ago
  No, it's not. "Public good" is some evolving, tenuous, emotional standard, not a legal definition. If you want to renegotiate property law, we have a branch for that: your state's legislature.
- babesh 5y ago
  Read the Constitution. It limits powers even when it is in the so called public interest.
- kelnos 5y ago
  > Weighing whether an infringement of personal rights have a legitament purpose and are justified is the court's job. No it's not; the court's job is to determine if the matter brought before them is legal and constitutional or not. It's Congress' job to decide where the line between property rights and the public interest is. While I'm very much in favor of an eviction moratorium right now, it does feel like the CDC exceeded their legal authority here.
draw_down 5y ago
Get used to it my friend, that ship sailed long ago. The court effects changes elected officials are too timid to effect themselves (to say nothing of whether those changes are good or bad). It is a site of politics. The court is why gay people can get married in our country, to pick but one example.

EGreg 5y ago

A nation of homeless people or increase in housing insecurity would be worse for the economy, wouldn’t it? And the effective IQ would drop as well… This is a case where enforcing private property rights has a negative effect on the economy, while a UBI would have a positive effect. It runs counter to the free-market theories for the same reason as abolishing debtors’ prisons in favor of bankruptcy protections and limited liability companies increases people’s ability to take entrepreneurial risks.

gillytech 5y ago
And paying people's rent for them is somehow good for the economy? I have been seeing a lot of headlines lately about how it's incredibly difficult to find workers as economies are reopening. If one has a job, they should be able to pay rent, in theory. This super-welfare scenario we have been in for the past 1 1/2 years can't possibly continue. What's good for the economy is the exchange of goods and services produced by the people that make up said economy.
- totesraunch 5y ago
  And people can't survive on slave wages. The people running the country (USA) are out of touch with the current reality many people live in. This isn't the ,1950s where a part time job can sustain anyone.
  - gillytech 5y ago
    I hear you, and I agree that there are definitely problems with wages in this country. But the thing to really understand is that the value of money is the collective value of the goods and services exchanged in the economy. It's really just that simple. You need to produce, personally, real value in order to get enough money to acquire the services of another (room and board of some kind). There are exceptions to this rule of course (stock market, currency market and commodities speculators, looking at you). Think about this long and hard and anyone can see the connections between value traded for value. This is why a free market is the best possible solution to a large economy. When government gets involved, their authoritarian solutions (take money from one person and give it to another, without the exchange of true value) will never have long term workability. If someone wants to work a minimum wage job in America, they should not expect to be able to acquire luxury goods or anything of great value other than being able to subsist. It's nothing against them, it's just that the value being provided by the worker is not generally that valuable. This is in itself a UBI of sorts. Nobody inherently has the right to simply take from another (food, shelter, healthcare) simply for being alive and providing nothing in return. But showing up to a job and clocking in and clocking out every day, and doing one's job will bring in some return and you can then go out and exchange that for survival needs. Now if you want to live a little better you're going to want to provide more value than is expected and you will get more return on that. A simple example is waiting tips. I have definitely tipped bigger for service people who put in extra value. And above all else, morale and general happiness of a culture goes up when people are producing and exchanging HIGH VALUE. This is not the economy taught in schools. "Economics" as a subject has been mired down so thoroughly in complexity, trapdoors and dead ends nobody can agree on anything, and socialism and communism emerge as great concepts. It's just that "nobody has quite implemented socialism [which is communism] correctly" and thus resulted in untold suffering, misery and death throughout the ages. If communism is so great then why do so many people flee socialist and communist countries and try to make it to the USA? Because we have a FREE MARKET. Not total government appropriations and grants, yet.

gumby 5y ago

I think the landlords will rue this decision. Yes, some will be able to turf out a tenant and replace them with a higher paying one, and those landlords will be glad. But many will not be able to; now, instead getting the rent check from the government,* they will get nothing. Yes, the hiring market is hot, but only for certain sectors. Others, for example service sectors servicing office staff, have yet to recover. And the realtor association: they just want transaction volume: each eviction, they hope, will generate a future commission event. For the reasons above: I doubt it. * though the government has been derelict so far in making these payments.

MattGaiser 5y ago
> * though the government has been derelict so far in making these payments. So why would landlords prefer a program which pays no money? Better to be rid of the tenant to at least reduce wear and tear.
- gumby 5y ago
  The money has been allocated, payment has been slow. Which is both in law and in practice different from “pays no money”. This is like the first round of COVID support forgivable loans: didn’t manage to start up right away. Now it won’t be available at all.
  - babesh 5y ago
    Even if you assume that the money will come, you would have lost the opportunity cost of the money. Also in the meantime, if you had a mortgage on the property, you would have to make up that income on your own which is a double opportunity cost. In the meantime, inflation is running over 5%. If you look at SF apartments, you will see many landlords who are selling at what seem to be low prices. Of course, SF and the surrounding Bay Area are affected by remote work as well. It doesn't seem to be a good time to be a landlord in this area?
- bawolff 5y ago
  Tennants who can't pay also probably are less respectful of the property. Not like they have any money to lose if they wreck the place.

MattGaiser 5y ago

Why exactly are so many people not paying rent between the enhanced amount of unemployment that was given out and the labor shortage and rising wages that come with that? Who is this population of people who are not paying and why? Did a lot not manage to get unemployment benefits in the first place? Are landlords evicting tenants who owe back rent even if they are paying now? Is it just a matter of waiting for school to start up again so they can work?

csomar 5y ago
Are you asking why the law was put in the first place. You are living in a bubble where you (and your family/friends) respect your obligations. Surprise, most of society doesn't.
- sparrish 5y ago
  It wasn't a law. The Supreme Court says it was an illegal executive action.
anovikov 5y ago
For the absolutely stupid reason: they aren't paying because they can.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  That is what I am trying to figure out. Are there actually millions of people unable to pay or do they just see this as an easy way to have more money and get housing for free? A friend of a friend did this though. Went from $0 to 6 figures in assets just by investing his rent money as he kept his job.
  - malwarebytess 5y ago
    Renters still owe. If their 'tenants' have any money to collect, like your friend of a friend, they certainly can be got to. Most people do not have the money.

SamPatt 5y ago

> "The public interest strongly favors respecting the CDC’s judgment at this moment, when over 90 percent of counties are experiencing high transmission rates," Breyer wrote. I wonder if the Supreme Court doing their job and weighing in on the legality of executive branch actions is also in the public interest?

loxias 5y ago
> I wonder if the Supreme Court doing their job and weighing in on the legality of executive branch actions is also in the public interest? Apparently not.
detaro 5y ago
... he comments under the Supreme Court doing exactly that. (and yes, a justice having a different opinion is part of that, and no, he didn't just say that public interest overrides, but specifically argues why he thinks the modified moratorium could be legal. But cherry-picking quotes is fun I guess)
- SamPatt 5y ago
  The dissenting opinion is relevant. Judges making policy from the bench is an age old issue.
  - detaro 5y ago
    Yes, and I'm pointing out that the dissenting opinion is weighing in on the legality of it, you just choose a quote that's not about that part.
dehrmann 5y ago
It's been a year and a half. The emergency justifications are gone, so it's time for congress to act. It's the judicial branch's job to act as a check on the power of the executive branch.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago