5 ms·

The government would pay to do it. Or there would be taxes or rents paid to developers in accordance to the number of people housed x the quality of the housing

The government would pay to do it. Or there would be taxes or rents paid to developers in accordance to the number of people housed x the quality of the housing. Or people like me would rent units because housing is important, and rent their space at cost. We can choose to pay for housing for everyone, we just have to adjust the formulas we use to decide who benefits.

notch656a 4y ago
>The government would pay to do it. That's just a loopback to where you started. When government pays, you pay.
- turtledove 4y ago
  Yes. And also no. Today, if I cannot pay, I get no housing. Taxes allow us, as a community, to decide that we should all chip in a little bit extra (commensurate to our means) to make sure everyone has a roof over their heads. Also, government operated facilities do not have a profit motive, so there's less incentive to maximize the cost of housing.
  - refurb 4y ago
    Hilarious how your system gets more and more complex requiring more and more rules. You’re basically taking a market that has an artificially constrained supply and trying to replace it with an entirely planned system. Why?
    - turtledove 4y ago
      Why? Because the current system leads to poverty, inequity, homelessness, waste, inefficiency, etc. And to be clear, I've proposed a system of adjusted incentives followed by but not necessarily required to be followed by a more planned system.
      - refurb 4y ago
        No doubt you'll need more "fixes" before you're done. It's like rent control in SF or public housing in Singapore. Design a new system and you'll create loopholes to be exploited. Fix those and new loopholes are created. And on and on. Easier to just remove government restrictions to supply and build until prices come down.
        KptMarchewa 4y ago
        >public housing in Singapore Which is a huge success.
        notch656a 4y ago
        For who? How's that working out for the 1/3 of Singapore who is completely ineligible, yet pays taxes into the public coffers? Singapore is unique in that they have a massive well (proportionally much bigger than US) of workers paying taxes who are ineligible for much of the fruits of those taxes. Only the 2/3 with Citizenship or PR can meaningfully get public housing. I'm sure about any nation could have more affordable housing if they have endless wells of guest workers who can shoulder the cost without yielding that benefit for themselves.
        refurb 4y ago
        Success how? If you're talking about providing housing in a country that had little quality housing 70 years ago, then yes, it's successful. If it's providing affordable housing for young people, then I'd challenge that. You can't even apply for public housing unless you are married (otherwise wait until after you are 35). The government overbuilt before, so now it's a 4-5 year wait after you win a lottery to get a house. People are still pumping real estate like crazy and the average home in the resale market is >$1M now (which is a 3 bedroom, 100 sq m apartment with a 99 year lease). Singapore is stuck in the exact same situation as every other developed country - housing is an asset that the middle class expects a healthy return on, yet increasing costs are a barrier to new owners.
  - notch656a 4y ago
    >Also, government operated facilities do not have a profit motive, Great, so the shit-show we have now, except without any incentive to efficiently spend. Sure that will go over swimmingly. Everyone knows that government construction projects are known for coming on-time and on-budget, and for the best value.
    - turtledove 4y ago
      Seattle just built a major light rail expansion ahead of schedule and under budget. But I specifically believe in building more, smaller units. Places with eg 20 apartments. By building smaller scoped projects, costs are better understood up front, maintenance costs are lower, and you need less specialized construction expertise. Building 50 20-unit complexes to house a thousand families is going to serve everyone better than building one mega project to house a thousand families.
      - notch656a 4y ago
        This light rail [0]? [0] "Light-rail cost soars $1 billion" https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=20001213&slug=TTGI2KF2J https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=20001213&slug... -------- Edit: here's another one "Sound Transit’s light-rail system, called Link, has also had its share of challenges. The 25 miles of light rail that voters were told would be completed by 2006 at a cost of $1.7 billion, have resulted in 23 miles of track which, when completed, will end up costing $5.2 billion." "The $2.6 billion spent so far on the starter light-rail line takes the rider from Westlake Station downtown to an airport station 0.4 mile from the terminal in 37 minutes. " https://seattlebusinessmag.com/article/why-sound-transits-projects-are-so-costly#:~:text=The%2025%20miles%20of%20light,end%20up%20costing%20%245.2%20billion https://seattlebusinessmag.com/article/why-sound-transits-pr....
        turtledove 4y ago
        Sort of? That's a very old article. The project was voted on as a $1.6B project, and was approved. It came in almost two hundred million under budget in 2016. This is the project I'm describing: https://mynorthwest.com/24890/university-link-light-rail-to-open-early-under-budget/ https://mynorthwest.com/24890/university-link-light-rail-to-...
cycrutchfield 4y ago
So basically everybody should live in a Khrushchyovka. Real central planning communist slum type housing.
- turtledove 4y ago
  There's a meme that shows "leftist housing", and it depicts concrete tenements. It shows "capitalist housing", and it depicts tents under a bridge. Haha. But memes aside, no, there are many, many examples of public and social housing that are not concrete slums. Look at Singapore, Paris, the Marxhof in Vienna. Quayside Village in Vancouver. If you'd like, I can provide links to many examples from many countries around the world of successful public housing that isn't Soviet bloc housing.
  - cycrutchfield 4y ago
    As many people have told you repeatedly throughout this thread, your understanding of the great success of glorious public housing worldwide is seriously misguided at best. But I suspect you most likely just glean all of your political opinions from memes, which could explain some things.
    - turtledove 4y ago
      My apologies for bringing some levity to the discussion. It seems I've upset you, not the intent. There's a lot of people building straw men in the comments, and then pointing out how flimsy those straw men are, I'll grant you that.
  - yourusername 4y ago
    Social housing here in the Netherlands isn't quite soviet block but it's poorly built and maintained to the lowest acceptable standard. In streets where one side of the street has been sold to private owners you can see the difference. The privately owned houses are well maintained and have received upgrades where the social housing is merely 'acceptable'. I'm also familiar with how the assignment process for social housing works. I'm not sure how acceptable you think it is to wait 10 years to be able to move to a different city. Social housing must look nice from a distance but i wouldn't want all housing to be social housing.
Ferrotin 4y ago
We already have voters deciding how much housing gets built. The result is we have not enough of it. We’ve also seen, during this pandemic, what happens to rental prices when landlords are powerless over tenants. They go up. And landlords discriminate harder against tenants who look like they’ll be bad tenants if they can’t easily evict. And just as my ability to get sued is what allows me to enter contracts, my ability to get evicted is what lets me pay cheap rent.

notch656a 4y ago

>The government would pay to do it. That's just a loopback to where you started. When government pays, you pay.

turtledove 4y ago
Yes. And also no. Today, if I cannot pay, I get no housing. Taxes allow us, as a community, to decide that we should all chip in a little bit extra (commensurate to our means) to make sure everyone has a roof over their heads. Also, government operated facilities do not have a profit motive, so there's less incentive to maximize the cost of housing.
- refurb 4y ago
  Hilarious how your system gets more and more complex requiring more and more rules. You’re basically taking a market that has an artificially constrained supply and trying to replace it with an entirely planned system. Why?
  - turtledove 4y ago
    Why? Because the current system leads to poverty, inequity, homelessness, waste, inefficiency, etc. And to be clear, I've proposed a system of adjusted incentives followed by but not necessarily required to be followed by a more planned system.
    - refurb 4y ago
      No doubt you'll need more "fixes" before you're done. It's like rent control in SF or public housing in Singapore. Design a new system and you'll create loopholes to be exploited. Fix those and new loopholes are created. And on and on. Easier to just remove government restrictions to supply and build until prices come down.
      - KptMarchewa 4y ago
        >public housing in Singapore Which is a huge success.
        notch656a 4y ago
        For who? How's that working out for the 1/3 of Singapore who is completely ineligible, yet pays taxes into the public coffers? Singapore is unique in that they have a massive well (proportionally much bigger than US) of workers paying taxes who are ineligible for much of the fruits of those taxes. Only the 2/3 with Citizenship or PR can meaningfully get public housing. I'm sure about any nation could have more affordable housing if they have endless wells of guest workers who can shoulder the cost without yielding that benefit for themselves.
        refurb 4y ago
        Success how? If you're talking about providing housing in a country that had little quality housing 70 years ago, then yes, it's successful. If it's providing affordable housing for young people, then I'd challenge that. You can't even apply for public housing unless you are married (otherwise wait until after you are 35). The government overbuilt before, so now it's a 4-5 year wait after you win a lottery to get a house. People are still pumping real estate like crazy and the average home in the resale market is >$1M now (which is a 3 bedroom, 100 sq m apartment with a 99 year lease). Singapore is stuck in the exact same situation as every other developed country - housing is an asset that the middle class expects a healthy return on, yet increasing costs are a barrier to new owners.
- notch656a 4y ago
  >Also, government operated facilities do not have a profit motive, Great, so the shit-show we have now, except without any incentive to efficiently spend. Sure that will go over swimmingly. Everyone knows that government construction projects are known for coming on-time and on-budget, and for the best value.
  - turtledove 4y ago
    Seattle just built a major light rail expansion ahead of schedule and under budget. But I specifically believe in building more, smaller units. Places with eg 20 apartments. By building smaller scoped projects, costs are better understood up front, maintenance costs are lower, and you need less specialized construction expertise. Building 50 20-unit complexes to house a thousand families is going to serve everyone better than building one mega project to house a thousand families.
    - notch656a 4y ago
      This light rail [0]? [0] "Light-rail cost soars $1 billion" https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=20001213&slug=TTGI2KF2J https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=20001213&slug... -------- Edit: here's another one "Sound Transit’s light-rail system, called Link, has also had its share of challenges. The 25 miles of light rail that voters were told would be completed by 2006 at a cost of $1.7 billion, have resulted in 23 miles of track which, when completed, will end up costing $5.2 billion." "The $2.6 billion spent so far on the starter light-rail line takes the rider from Westlake Station downtown to an airport station 0.4 mile from the terminal in 37 minutes. " https://seattlebusinessmag.com/article/why-sound-transits-projects-are-so-costly#:~:text=The%2025%20miles%20of%20light,end%20up%20costing%20%245.2%20billion https://seattlebusinessmag.com/article/why-sound-transits-pr....
      - turtledove 4y ago
        Sort of? That's a very old article. The project was voted on as a $1.6B project, and was approved. It came in almost two hundred million under budget in 2016. This is the project I'm describing: https://mynorthwest.com/24890/university-link-light-rail-to-open-early-under-budget/ https://mynorthwest.com/24890/university-link-light-rail-to-...

cycrutchfield 4y ago

So basically everybody should live in a Khrushchyovka. Real central planning communist slum type housing.

turtledove 4y ago
There's a meme that shows "leftist housing", and it depicts concrete tenements. It shows "capitalist housing", and it depicts tents under a bridge. Haha. But memes aside, no, there are many, many examples of public and social housing that are not concrete slums. Look at Singapore, Paris, the Marxhof in Vienna. Quayside Village in Vancouver. If you'd like, I can provide links to many examples from many countries around the world of successful public housing that isn't Soviet bloc housing.
- cycrutchfield 4y ago
  As many people have told you repeatedly throughout this thread, your understanding of the great success of glorious public housing worldwide is seriously misguided at best. But I suspect you most likely just glean all of your political opinions from memes, which could explain some things.
  - turtledove 4y ago
    My apologies for bringing some levity to the discussion. It seems I've upset you, not the intent. There's a lot of people building straw men in the comments, and then pointing out how flimsy those straw men are, I'll grant you that.
- yourusername 4y ago
  Social housing here in the Netherlands isn't quite soviet block but it's poorly built and maintained to the lowest acceptable standard. In streets where one side of the street has been sold to private owners you can see the difference. The privately owned houses are well maintained and have received upgrades where the social housing is merely 'acceptable'. I'm also familiar with how the assignment process for social housing works. I'm not sure how acceptable you think it is to wait 10 years to be able to move to a different city. Social housing must look nice from a distance but i wouldn't want all housing to be social housing.

Ferrotin 4y ago

We already have voters deciding how much housing gets built. The result is we have not enough of it. We’ve also seen, during this pandemic, what happens to rental prices when landlords are powerless over tenants. They go up. And landlords discriminate harder against tenants who look like they’ll be bad tenants if they can’t easily evict. And just as my ability to get sued is what allows me to enter contracts, my ability to get evicted is what lets me pay cheap rent.