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Ask HN: Shouldn't California Cut Its Housing Mandate in Light of Tech Layoffs?
- duped 4y agoWhy would less housing make anything better? California is decades behind on housing stock and it will take decades to recover. Downturn in one cycle is not worth it.
- shaburn 4y agoPopulation was decreasing prior to mass layoffs. Now we're just forcing inorganic increased supply; dropping property values.
- Sakos 4y agoImagine thinking that decreasing property values is a bad thing.
- duped 4y agoOne cannot argue there is a supply problem in California housing.
- shaburn 4y agoWhy?
- dragonwriter 4y ago> Population was decreasing prior to mass layoffs. Only since the pandemic cut immigration, and only slowly (though there was more intrastate redistribution.) But even so, that (and the net outmigration to other states that had been going on for decades even while international migration offset it) waa largely due to affordability concerns resulting fron inadequate housing supply. > Now we're just forcing inorganic increased supply; dropping property values. Since the mandates mostly favor multifamily homes, including by redevelopment, and undermine zoning restrictions, this probably raises value of existing properties (allowing more units on existing land increases land market value, reducing the proportion and absolute number of properties above a given size increases the improvement values of those larger properties.) It decreases the average price of a “housing unit”, but that people own concrete properties, not generic housing units that morph over time to whatever the current average unit is.
- forgotmysn 4y agoDefinitely not
- warning26 4y agoIf anything, layoffs mean more housing should be built, not less. Increase the supply and prices will fall.
- shaburn 4y agoSo punish existing property holders?
- synthpop 4y agoThey can keep holding their property? Homes are meant to be lived in by people.
- shaburn 4y agoIn reality, many if not most have their retirements held in their. In an astronomical cost of living place, this means poverty in practice with wealth on paper; breaking the social contract of the American Dream.
- larryliu 4y agoDo we want a mass construction workers layoff in addition to tech layoff? Tech recession should be countered by encouraging developments in all economic sectors, especially pro-development policies that doesn't cost taxpayer money.
- quantified 4y agoWhat fraction of the people and households in CA are that kind of tech? I bet not. EDIT: I am referring to fraction in terms of people, not tax dollars. If they're long term unemployed now, their tax value is low anyway.
- shaburn 4y agoThe majority of the tax base not employed by the massive public sector.
- quantified 4y agoThat's putting them in $$ terms, not requirements for housing. A few high-incomers don't need that many houses.
- shaburn 4y agoMost visas are granted for tech in CA as well. Net New. Hard to decouple.
- quantified 4y ago10% of the population of the USA lives in California. This is why I have my doubts. Cheerleaders say that from 1.18MM to 1.88MM people work in tech in California, but there's high vs not-so-high tech and the tech of Lockheed and SpaceX is quite different than the tech of Meta and Twitter. 1.88MM means that 1 in 20 work in tech. In Massachusetts, similar cheerleaders say that 11% of the residents work in tech.
- dragonwriter 4y agoWhat does one have to do with the other? Do substantially less people need housing in general, or lower cost housing in particular, than before the layoffs?