4 ms·

This the right path: entire city that is wholly owned by one company, with nothing for sale, only rentals. Gated. City council is same thing as company's board

This the right path: entire city that is wholly owned by one company, with nothing for sale, only rentals. Gated. City council is same thing as company's board of directors. Police are private guards. You fail to pay the rent of violate rules, you are escorted off the premises: no homelessness, no unemployment, and minimum crime. Near-equality and almost flat social structure, no hate or envy. It will be expensive, but personally i'd love to pay twice to live in a place like that.

lazide 3y ago
How do you expect it will be equal and have a flat social structure, instead of it likely mirroring the companies hierarchy?
- guerrilla 3y ago
  I wouldn't expect a valid answer from this person since they already contradicted themselves. "City council is same thing as company's board of directors" is incompatible with a "flat social structure" being that the former is a hierarchy and the latter is the absence of hierarchy.
- anovikov 3y ago
  Simply, because poor/unemployed will be kicked out, and owners/idle rich not living there at all because why would them. The place will be only as differentiated as salaries of employed persons are differentiated, which is, not much.
  - dagw 3y ago
    You cannot kick out the poor, because you need them to clean for you and make your food. At best you can price them out of living next to you.
    - lazide 3y ago
      That’s why you make them live next door (or far away) and commute. That’s the plan with this community right, since the folks there must work for the company? If the company doesn’t keep them employed, voila they must leave. And presumably the company is not going to hire (or allow to live there) ‘undesirables’.
      - dagw 3y ago
        That’s the plan with this community right, since the folks there must work for the company? It's not that sort of company town. The Company is the town and the town is the The Company. They will own all the buildings and infrastructure, be responsible for providing all the services and as such get to decide who gets to live there and how, but they'll be doing so with a goal of running a profitable company/town. The people living there won't (necessarily) be working for the company. As long as you can pay, agree to live by their rules and aren't 'undesirable' in any other way you can potentially live there.
        lazide 3y ago
        Disney has a similar setup - and you have to be working there or a ‘guest’ (aka customer) usually via a paid pass to get in. It’s the same thing, just with no customers being able to show up on site no? Or do you think the company will allow randomly renting to non-employees in the housing? Or subletting or something?
        dagw 3y ago
        do you think the company will allow randomly renting to non-employees in the housing? Or subletting or something? The housing won't be (primarily) for company employees, but for anybody who can pay and gets approved. Most company employees will in fact probably be people doing maintenance and providing services to the residents, and they almost certainly won't be able to afford to live in the the town.
tetris11 3y ago
London's Canary Wharf/ Banking Sector is a very good description of what you're describing up there, private police force and everything. It is nice to look at for a day, but it is a dead and soulless place, and the lack of activity at night paired with the high/clean/bland architecture is somehow more frightening than walking down a narrow alleyway anywhere else in the city. It is a distinctly anti people feeling, knowing that a place was not built for you, but it is permitting you to stay there for now.
- bolyarche 3y ago
  [dead]
- nly 3y ago
  Parts of CW are ok at night. It's improving. I went there for dinner with an old friend the other week and it was buzzing.
- Roark66 3y ago
  Come on, I lived on the Isle of Dogs (2 manilla st) for 2 years. That's right next to Canary Wharf (a literal 2 minute walk). While it's true the actual Canary Wharf area has its own private guards its not a typical gated community. Yes, there are clever underground car barriers(I don't think I ever saw them closed though), but there are no surrounding fences etc. I don't think it's a good example of a "private owned gated community" at all. Anyone can just walk in. Also, Isle of Dogs is a great example of how private/public partnerships can lift an area out of poverty. The Tower Hamlets area which Isle of Dogs is a part of has been a very poor area with lots of drug/theft/poor housing problems etc. Then lots of high rises were built (including the one I lived in) and some petty crime remained, but the quality of life was pretty good there. The best things being really good access to public transport, access to the river, shops/restaurants an NHS health centre that isn't overwhelmed with patients etc.
- richliss 3y ago
  Canary Wharf is absolutely soulless but it's neither dead or frightening. It will almost certainly be the safest place to live in central London due to the fact that it's private land and you can be expelled from it permanently and the cameras everywhere will help security find you. I've heard stories of a person who worked at a certain bank getting into a fight for the second time in a bar and then getting banned from CW - they could not go to work anymore. It is absolutely a place that sets narrow parameters for your behaviour and if you can operate within those parameters there are companies who pay well operating there, clean streets, no visible crime etc.
southerntofu 3y ago
This is a proved-wrong path throughout history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_town https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_town Company towns are one form of what former slaves called "wage slavery" in that time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_Slavery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_Slavery Capitalism is many things but certainly not flat or equalitarian.
- anovikov 3y ago
  Company towns existed because people worked for the company and company made money by exploiting them which worked the best when they were effectively locked up in one place. Here, the company will make money by people staying there and paying it, thus they will compete by providing best conditions to everyone.
  - malermeister 3y ago
    Who will they compete with? Wouldn't they have a monopoly in housing in this scenario?
    - dagw 3y ago
      Who will they compete with? The next town over. The theory is that if the town is good enough, rich people will pay a premium to live in this town rather than then one a few miles down the road. Then businesses will pay a premium to rent commercial space there since it will give them access to a 'better' class of customers etc. etc.
      - malermeister 3y ago
        That implies a complete freedom from all attachment. What if your job is in the worse town? What if your aging parents are?
        dagw 3y ago
        What if your job is in the worse town? What if your aging parents are? You commute, like people do today. Living in one town, working in another and having your parents in a third sounds completely normal
dkh 3y ago
Disney thought so, it was the original plan for Epcot prior to his death: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPCOT_(concept) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPCOT_(concept)
- _puk 3y ago
  It looks like "private residential club communities" are still a thing: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-66536183 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-66536...
growt 3y ago
I really hope that I just missed the sarcasm in this comment
KaiserPro 3y ago
> no homelessness, no unemployment, and minimum crime ... where you are. Its just exported to elsewhere. South africa had a similar system, it was great for about 10% of people, less so for the rest.
hipratham 3y ago
Strong Irvine vibes.
bluescrn 3y ago
And then there’s the 12 districts outside of the Capitol.

lazide 3y ago

How do you expect it will be equal and have a flat social structure, instead of it likely mirroring the companies hierarchy?

guerrilla 3y ago
I wouldn't expect a valid answer from this person since they already contradicted themselves. "City council is same thing as company's board of directors" is incompatible with a "flat social structure" being that the former is a hierarchy and the latter is the absence of hierarchy.
anovikov 3y ago
Simply, because poor/unemployed will be kicked out, and owners/idle rich not living there at all because why would them. The place will be only as differentiated as salaries of employed persons are differentiated, which is, not much.
- dagw 3y ago
  You cannot kick out the poor, because you need them to clean for you and make your food. At best you can price them out of living next to you.
  - lazide 3y ago
    That’s why you make them live next door (or far away) and commute. That’s the plan with this community right, since the folks there must work for the company? If the company doesn’t keep them employed, voila they must leave. And presumably the company is not going to hire (or allow to live there) ‘undesirables’.
    - dagw 3y ago
      That’s the plan with this community right, since the folks there must work for the company? It's not that sort of company town. The Company is the town and the town is the The Company. They will own all the buildings and infrastructure, be responsible for providing all the services and as such get to decide who gets to live there and how, but they'll be doing so with a goal of running a profitable company/town. The people living there won't (necessarily) be working for the company. As long as you can pay, agree to live by their rules and aren't 'undesirable' in any other way you can potentially live there.
      - lazide 3y ago
        Disney has a similar setup - and you have to be working there or a ‘guest’ (aka customer) usually via a paid pass to get in. It’s the same thing, just with no customers being able to show up on site no? Or do you think the company will allow randomly renting to non-employees in the housing? Or subletting or something?
        dagw 3y ago
        do you think the company will allow randomly renting to non-employees in the housing? Or subletting or something? The housing won't be (primarily) for company employees, but for anybody who can pay and gets approved. Most company employees will in fact probably be people doing maintenance and providing services to the residents, and they almost certainly won't be able to afford to live in the the town.

tetris11 3y ago

London's Canary Wharf/ Banking Sector is a very good description of what you're describing up there, private police force and everything. It is nice to look at for a day, but it is a dead and soulless place, and the lack of activity at night paired with the high/clean/bland architecture is somehow more frightening than walking down a narrow alleyway anywhere else in the city. It is a distinctly anti people feeling, knowing that a place was not built for you, but it is permitting you to stay there for now.

bolyarche 3y ago
[dead]
nly 3y ago
Parts of CW are ok at night. It's improving. I went there for dinner with an old friend the other week and it was buzzing.
Roark66 3y ago
Come on, I lived on the Isle of Dogs (2 manilla st) for 2 years. That's right next to Canary Wharf (a literal 2 minute walk). While it's true the actual Canary Wharf area has its own private guards its not a typical gated community. Yes, there are clever underground car barriers(I don't think I ever saw them closed though), but there are no surrounding fences etc. I don't think it's a good example of a "private owned gated community" at all. Anyone can just walk in. Also, Isle of Dogs is a great example of how private/public partnerships can lift an area out of poverty. The Tower Hamlets area which Isle of Dogs is a part of has been a very poor area with lots of drug/theft/poor housing problems etc. Then lots of high rises were built (including the one I lived in) and some petty crime remained, but the quality of life was pretty good there. The best things being really good access to public transport, access to the river, shops/restaurants an NHS health centre that isn't overwhelmed with patients etc.
richliss 3y ago
Canary Wharf is absolutely soulless but it's neither dead or frightening. It will almost certainly be the safest place to live in central London due to the fact that it's private land and you can be expelled from it permanently and the cameras everywhere will help security find you. I've heard stories of a person who worked at a certain bank getting into a fight for the second time in a bar and then getting banned from CW - they could not go to work anymore. It is absolutely a place that sets narrow parameters for your behaviour and if you can operate within those parameters there are companies who pay well operating there, clean streets, no visible crime etc.

southerntofu 3y ago

This is a proved-wrong path throughout history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_town https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Company_town Company towns are one form of what former slaves called "wage slavery" in that time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_Slavery https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_Slavery Capitalism is many things but certainly not flat or equalitarian.

anovikov 3y ago
Company towns existed because people worked for the company and company made money by exploiting them which worked the best when they were effectively locked up in one place. Here, the company will make money by people staying there and paying it, thus they will compete by providing best conditions to everyone.
- malermeister 3y ago
  Who will they compete with? Wouldn't they have a monopoly in housing in this scenario?
  - dagw 3y ago
    Who will they compete with? The next town over. The theory is that if the town is good enough, rich people will pay a premium to live in this town rather than then one a few miles down the road. Then businesses will pay a premium to rent commercial space there since it will give them access to a 'better' class of customers etc. etc.
    - malermeister 3y ago
      That implies a complete freedom from all attachment. What if your job is in the worse town? What if your aging parents are?
      - dagw 3y ago
        What if your job is in the worse town? What if your aging parents are? You commute, like people do today. Living in one town, working in another and having your parents in a third sounds completely normal

dkh 3y ago

Disney thought so, it was the original plan for Epcot prior to his death: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPCOT_(concept) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPCOT_(concept)

_puk 3y ago
It looks like "private residential club communities" are still a thing: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-66536183 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-66536...

growt 3y ago

I really hope that I just missed the sarcasm in this comment

KaiserPro 3y ago

> no homelessness, no unemployment, and minimum crime ... where you are. Its just exported to elsewhere. South africa had a similar system, it was great for about 10% of people, less so for the rest.

hipratham 3y ago

Strong Irvine vibes.

bluescrn 3y ago

And then there’s the 12 districts outside of the Capitol.