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The Sweden story sounds so much like the SF story. Area doesn’t building housing, leading to a massive increase in house prices and a destruction of class mobi

The Sweden story sounds so much like the SF story. Area doesn’t building housing, leading to a massive increase in house prices and a destruction of class mobility as the rich get richer (as their houses get more valuable) and the poor get poorer (as they pay more to rent the same living space). The growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime, worsening services, etc. as the govt cannot raise enough taxes. And finally, instead of solving the fundamental expensive housing problem, opportunists will blame the other. More often than not the other are the victims of the problems. Immigrants in Sweden’s case, and since one can’t blame immigrants for obvious reasons in SF, homeless people in SF.

deleted 4y ago
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bequanna 4y ago
> The growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime, worsening services, etc. as the govt cannot raise enough taxes. Hold up. I don’t think the people of San Francisco grew weary of increasing rents and decided to turn to a life of crime. Most of the “trouble makers” in the Bay Area are recent arrivals to the area and come because of poor policing and the government is generally more tolerant of them.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- tptacek 4y ago
  This is debunked every time it's brought up. The "trouble makers" you're referring to are local. It is not in fact the case that San Francisco mass-imports its downtrodden.
  - Entinel 4y ago
    Debunked with what data?
  - WillPostForFood 4y ago
    More like activists start the gaslight machine when people point out that a lot of the problem in SF is imported. https://cis.org/Arthur/Honduran-Migrants-and-San-Francisco-Drug-Trade https://cis.org/Arthur/Honduran-Migrants-and-San-Francisco-D... Here is the mayor apologizing for saying it. Not because it isn't true, but because you aren't supposed to say it out loud. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-10-20/san-francisco-mayor-apologizes-honduran-drug-dealers-comments https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-10-20/san-fran...
    - tptacek 4y ago
      Gross. This isn't about whether the majority of underclass people in San Francisco are native Californians, but rather a case that crime in the US is the fault of Hondurans and El Salvadorans. More Hondurans end up in Texas than in California, but nobody is posting memes about how order has broken down in Houston.
      - b112 4y ago
        More Hondurans end up in Texas than in California As a Canuck, immediately I thought "But Texans will shoot criminals". True or not, the belief is there for many. That does have some power. maybe.
        tptacek 4y ago
        No, it doesn't.
        b112 4y ago
        https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/04/01/truck-theft-ends-fatally-after-owner-tracks-suspect-with-airtag https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/04/01/truck-theft-ends-...
LegitShady 4y ago
In Canada even if they do build housing 1) the immigration rate is so high it isn't enough to keep up 2) the house values in areas that dont build in enough housing have skyrocketed, and smart homeowners in those areas have decided to sell and move to places with lower house prices and purchase more than one, which of course rockets the price even in the places that do build a lot. So even in provinces where lots of housing is built, immigration from other countries and other provinces blows up the housing prices anyways. 3) The government doesn't want to do anything about it because immigration is how they're keeping down wages, and since housing has become so much of the GDP they're terrified of what it would mean for the economy if there was a price crash anyways, so they don't look at policies that would fight the housing price explosion in fear of what the economy will look like if they do.
- sumedh 4y ago
  > The government doesn't want to do anything Looks like the voters dont want to do anything either, if they keep re-electing the same party/politicians.
  - LegitShady 4y ago
    All 3 of the major parties are pro huge immigration. Any discussion to the contrary is labelled racist regardless of a housing and healthcare crisis. Businesses underpay and when they can't find people willing to impoverish themselves to work for them, they apply to the government to bring in "temporary foreign workers" - for things like fast food restaurant workers not essential business, keeping the wages down. Temporary foreign workers and international students in canada are allowed to buy housing, so aside from renting the rich ones who make it here actually buy up properties for their family offshore. Even if Canadians vote out Trudeau, Poilievre of the conservatives has no interest in slowing down immigration or affecting policies to improve access to housing. The leader of the NDP, Singh, is useless and his party is also very pro immigration and has no housing policies that would affect the market. What we're seeing is a death spiral of some kind but I'm not sure where the ultimate end goes - no doctors, no housing, low wages compared to housing and food costs, etc. This is textbook conditions for serious blowback and social instability. When asked why there wasn't anything in this years announced budget to deal with the housing crisis Christina Freedland says that they're still spending money from last year's budget on it. Well how about you see the fruits of your labours and realize it isn't working out well for Canadians, and do something else/more? If we don't manage to vote trudeau out this time around I'm going to look into immigrating to texas. People joke about that but texas recognizes my professional licensing and all I'd need is a job offer.
amelius 4y ago
> the rich get richer (...) and the poor get poorer It's always the same story. Can't we just make the economy more fair by saying that the wealth gap must at least be smaller than some value or else the rich will pay (taxes) to make it so?
- satvikpendem 4y ago
  Lots of people say this but very few have a concrete idea of what is needed to accomplish this. What taxes are the rich going to pay? Who among the rich? How does one define "rich?" Et cetera.
  - amelius 4y ago
    Well, it could be simple, but the most important reason that it is not simple is because the rich control the system.
    - satvikpendem 4y ago
      It really isn't that simple, because again, no one really can say how it is so simple, merely that it is, somehow. Economists also talk about this point often, and they also can't agree, generally speaking, on how to, or even if to, reduce the inequality gap. The best solutions I've seen are land value taxes, inheritance and estate taxes, and taxes on loans backed by stock; and among the worst are unrealized capital gains taxes.
      - amelius 4y ago
        Economists are part of the problem. When the rich are getting richer and the poor work their asses off and still get poorer, then just about any solution is better and the more decent thing to do than keeping disagreeing about what is the best solution.
        b112 4y ago
        then just about any solution How can you make such a claim, when you look at the state of many regions/countries in the world?
UncleOxidant 4y ago
> The Sweden story sounds so much like the SF story. It sounds like the same story being repeated all over the world. There was someone on comments here on another thread talking about how this is a problem in Ireland now as well. It's not just SF in the US, it's all over the place. A friend recently told me about his search for a place to rent in rural western Washington and they said it was just impossible to find even a one bedroom place under $1800/mo even in this rural area where incomes are much lower than in the urban centers like Seattle and Tacoma.
- bandrami 4y ago
  I don't know about Ireland, but in the US the home ownership rate is higher than it was at any point in the 20th century. So however bad the situation is it doesn't seem to actually prevent people from buying a house.
  - b112 4y ago
    In the 90s, I didn't know anyone in their 20s, who didn't have a roommate(or two!), or were married. No one I knew, could afford an entire apartment to themselves! I find it weird that people complain about not being able to rent their own entire apartment, but are in their 20s. It wasn't a thing 30 years ago! As one advances in their career, eg in their 30s, then income tends to rise, due to experience, and better paying jobs. San Fran is an outlier here. Literally the most expensive area on the planet, with loads of money floating around. Of course rent is crazy expensive.
    - bandrami 4y ago
      Anecdote is always dangerous, but 100% same here; I had housemates in the 1990s and this was entirely normal in the city I was in (DC). Come to think of it the only time before I got married I lived alone was when I rented a friend's basement for a couple of years basically as a favor to him.
    - Aeolun 4y ago
      In the 90s I didn’t have a house, I was in diapers. In my experience growing up, everyone I knew could afford to buy a house on a single salary when 28-30, so that’s what I expect for myself. Anything other than that is a regression.
bandrami 4y ago
> the rich get richer ... and the poor get poorer I mean, what's actually happening is that the rich get richer and the poor also get richer but at a slower rate > growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime. So the opposite of what you said.
- ndsipa_pomu 4y ago
  > No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime. I wonder how much of that is due to removing lead from fuel?
  - bandrami 4y ago
    I thought that until the uptick in homicides of the past few years, since there wasn't an increase in lead at the start of the 21st century. I imagine it has more to do with incarcerating nearly 2% of the population, unfortunately.
klunger 4y ago
The same story could have been written about Oslo - my home - and the other major cities in Norway (Bergen, Stavanger, even Kristiansand). It's not so bad in the country side, but there are very few jobs there. I have some friends (a couple with 1 kid) who moved to distant suburbs of Oslo for more affordable housing. But the long commutes destroyed their quality of life and put a strain on their marriage. They are now moving back to a tiny, very expensive rental in Oslo. Its a definitive step down from when they left. We have outgrown our apartment -- the kids are getting bigger. So, we really need a 4 bedroom place (ideally 5 so we could have an office, but we'd settle for 4 and a desk in the living room). There are no apartments - which would be a lot more affordable than a house - that large here. The max bedroom count in apartments here that I have ever seen is 3, which we already have. So we are planning to buy a 2-unit house ("tomannsbolig") with another couple with kids. It's the only way we can afford something with enough bedrooms, without a large inheritance or something like that. None of us have anything like that coming. We have 4 "good," stable jobs (programmers, researchers etc). Even with other couple in the mix, it feels impossible to find something in the same school district. We've been looking for over a year. So, we are thinking about looking for a third friend or couple, since there are a few houses that have 3 units. It's just tricky to find someone you feel comfortable enough with to ask that. But we hope that 5-6 incomes will be enough in this market. *Before anyone tells me my kids can keep sharing bedrooms, try telling that to them! The increasing need for privacy and lack of space is becoming a real problem here.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

bequanna 4y ago

> The growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime, worsening services, etc. as the govt cannot raise enough taxes. Hold up. I don’t think the people of San Francisco grew weary of increasing rents and decided to turn to a life of crime. Most of the “trouble makers” in the Bay Area are recent arrivals to the area and come because of poor policing and the government is generally more tolerant of them.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
tptacek 4y ago
This is debunked every time it's brought up. The "trouble makers" you're referring to are local. It is not in fact the case that San Francisco mass-imports its downtrodden.
- Entinel 4y ago
  Debunked with what data?
- WillPostForFood 4y ago
  More like activists start the gaslight machine when people point out that a lot of the problem in SF is imported. https://cis.org/Arthur/Honduran-Migrants-and-San-Francisco-Drug-Trade https://cis.org/Arthur/Honduran-Migrants-and-San-Francisco-D... Here is the mayor apologizing for saying it. Not because it isn't true, but because you aren't supposed to say it out loud. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-10-20/san-francisco-mayor-apologizes-honduran-drug-dealers-comments https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-10-20/san-fran...
  - tptacek 4y ago
    Gross. This isn't about whether the majority of underclass people in San Francisco are native Californians, but rather a case that crime in the US is the fault of Hondurans and El Salvadorans. More Hondurans end up in Texas than in California, but nobody is posting memes about how order has broken down in Houston.
    - b112 4y ago
      More Hondurans end up in Texas than in California As a Canuck, immediately I thought "But Texans will shoot criminals". True or not, the belief is there for many. That does have some power. maybe.
      - tptacek 4y ago
        No, it doesn't.
        b112 4y ago
        https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/04/01/truck-theft-ends-fatally-after-owner-tracks-suspect-with-airtag https://appleinsider.com/articles/23/04/01/truck-theft-ends-...

LegitShady 4y ago

In Canada even if they do build housing 1) the immigration rate is so high it isn't enough to keep up 2) the house values in areas that dont build in enough housing have skyrocketed, and smart homeowners in those areas have decided to sell and move to places with lower house prices and purchase more than one, which of course rockets the price even in the places that do build a lot. So even in provinces where lots of housing is built, immigration from other countries and other provinces blows up the housing prices anyways. 3) The government doesn't want to do anything about it because immigration is how they're keeping down wages, and since housing has become so much of the GDP they're terrified of what it would mean for the economy if there was a price crash anyways, so they don't look at policies that would fight the housing price explosion in fear of what the economy will look like if they do.

sumedh 4y ago
> The government doesn't want to do anything Looks like the voters dont want to do anything either, if they keep re-electing the same party/politicians.
- LegitShady 4y ago
  All 3 of the major parties are pro huge immigration. Any discussion to the contrary is labelled racist regardless of a housing and healthcare crisis. Businesses underpay and when they can't find people willing to impoverish themselves to work for them, they apply to the government to bring in "temporary foreign workers" - for things like fast food restaurant workers not essential business, keeping the wages down. Temporary foreign workers and international students in canada are allowed to buy housing, so aside from renting the rich ones who make it here actually buy up properties for their family offshore. Even if Canadians vote out Trudeau, Poilievre of the conservatives has no interest in slowing down immigration or affecting policies to improve access to housing. The leader of the NDP, Singh, is useless and his party is also very pro immigration and has no housing policies that would affect the market. What we're seeing is a death spiral of some kind but I'm not sure where the ultimate end goes - no doctors, no housing, low wages compared to housing and food costs, etc. This is textbook conditions for serious blowback and social instability. When asked why there wasn't anything in this years announced budget to deal with the housing crisis Christina Freedland says that they're still spending money from last year's budget on it. Well how about you see the fruits of your labours and realize it isn't working out well for Canadians, and do something else/more? If we don't manage to vote trudeau out this time around I'm going to look into immigrating to texas. People joke about that but texas recognizes my professional licensing and all I'd need is a job offer.

amelius 4y ago

> the rich get richer (...) and the poor get poorer It's always the same story. Can't we just make the economy more fair by saying that the wealth gap must at least be smaller than some value or else the rich will pay (taxes) to make it so?

satvikpendem 4y ago
Lots of people say this but very few have a concrete idea of what is needed to accomplish this. What taxes are the rich going to pay? Who among the rich? How does one define "rich?" Et cetera.
- amelius 4y ago
  Well, it could be simple, but the most important reason that it is not simple is because the rich control the system.
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    It really isn't that simple, because again, no one really can say how it is so simple, merely that it is, somehow. Economists also talk about this point often, and they also can't agree, generally speaking, on how to, or even if to, reduce the inequality gap. The best solutions I've seen are land value taxes, inheritance and estate taxes, and taxes on loans backed by stock; and among the worst are unrealized capital gains taxes.
    - amelius 4y ago
      Economists are part of the problem. When the rich are getting richer and the poor work their asses off and still get poorer, then just about any solution is better and the more decent thing to do than keeping disagreeing about what is the best solution.
      - b112 4y ago
        then just about any solution How can you make such a claim, when you look at the state of many regions/countries in the world?

UncleOxidant 4y ago

> The Sweden story sounds so much like the SF story. It sounds like the same story being repeated all over the world. There was someone on comments here on another thread talking about how this is a problem in Ireland now as well. It's not just SF in the US, it's all over the place. A friend recently told me about his search for a place to rent in rural western Washington and they said it was just impossible to find even a one bedroom place under $1800/mo even in this rural area where incomes are much lower than in the urban centers like Seattle and Tacoma.

bandrami 4y ago
I don't know about Ireland, but in the US the home ownership rate is higher than it was at any point in the 20th century. So however bad the situation is it doesn't seem to actually prevent people from buying a house.
- b112 4y ago
  In the 90s, I didn't know anyone in their 20s, who didn't have a roommate(or two!), or were married. No one I knew, could afford an entire apartment to themselves! I find it weird that people complain about not being able to rent their own entire apartment, but are in their 20s. It wasn't a thing 30 years ago! As one advances in their career, eg in their 30s, then income tends to rise, due to experience, and better paying jobs. San Fran is an outlier here. Literally the most expensive area on the planet, with loads of money floating around. Of course rent is crazy expensive.
  - bandrami 4y ago
    Anecdote is always dangerous, but 100% same here; I had housemates in the 1990s and this was entirely normal in the city I was in (DC). Come to think of it the only time before I got married I lived alone was when I rented a friend's basement for a couple of years basically as a favor to him.
  - Aeolun 4y ago
    In the 90s I didn’t have a house, I was in diapers. In my experience growing up, everyone I knew could afford to buy a house on a single salary when 28-30, so that’s what I expect for myself. Anything other than that is a regression.

bandrami 4y ago

> the rich get richer ... and the poor get poorer I mean, what's actually happening is that the rich get richer and the poor also get richer but at a slower rate > growing wealth inequality leads to all sorts of other dysfunction including increased crime No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime. So the opposite of what you said.

ndsipa_pomu 4y ago
> No, we have significantly higher inequality than the 1990s and significantly lower crime. I wonder how much of that is due to removing lead from fuel?
- bandrami 4y ago
  I thought that until the uptick in homicides of the past few years, since there wasn't an increase in lead at the start of the 21st century. I imagine it has more to do with incarcerating nearly 2% of the population, unfortunately.

klunger 4y ago

The same story could have been written about Oslo - my home - and the other major cities in Norway (Bergen, Stavanger, even Kristiansand). It's not so bad in the country side, but there are very few jobs there. I have some friends (a couple with 1 kid) who moved to distant suburbs of Oslo for more affordable housing. But the long commutes destroyed their quality of life and put a strain on their marriage. They are now moving back to a tiny, very expensive rental in Oslo. Its a definitive step down from when they left. We have outgrown our apartment -- the kids are getting bigger. So, we really need a 4 bedroom place (ideally 5 so we could have an office, but we'd settle for 4 and a desk in the living room). There are no apartments - which would be a lot more affordable than a house - that large here. The max bedroom count in apartments here that I have ever seen is 3, which we already have. So we are planning to buy a 2-unit house ("tomannsbolig") with another couple with kids. It's the only way we can afford something with enough bedrooms, without a large inheritance or something like that. None of us have anything like that coming. We have 4 "good," stable jobs (programmers, researchers etc). Even with other couple in the mix, it feels impossible to find something in the same school district. We've been looking for over a year. So, we are thinking about looking for a third friend or couple, since there are a few houses that have 3 units. It's just tricky to find someone you feel comfortable enough with to ask that. But we hope that 5-6 incomes will be enough in this market. *Before anyone tells me my kids can keep sharing bedrooms, try telling that to them! The increasing need for privacy and lack of space is becoming a real problem here.