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You say this like every developer would be rushing out to build low-income housing if only they could. Developers build expensive luxury units because they can

You say this like every developer would be rushing out to build low-income housing if only they could. Developers build expensive luxury units because they can rent them for $2k a month by scalping tenants from nearby buildings who are currently paying $2.1k per month, because the buildings really don't cost that much more to build, the higher forecasted income from said renting makes it easier to sell to banks and get financed, and because every local politician is happy to have a new set of expensive units to tell the public about, especially if it's near a new commercial development they can hype up for bonus points. Because at the end of the day: people aren't housed because people need housing, people are housed because it is profitable to do so. And housing the middle class is always going to be more profitable than housing the poor. Which paradoxically means, as long as the motive is profit, it is incentivized more to cater to a smaller group of buyers with more money than a larger one with less. And, the ability for investment groups to write off losses means they are incentivized, in turn, to keep housing that the poor can't afford empty instead of lowering the rents, because too many renters at a lower rent would make them less money than simply holding onto the appreciating asset and writing off the lost rental income. This is not to say that government policy couldn't do a ton to fix this, but it's basically all policies that go against financial motivations in a system where money and power are incredibly well correlated with one another, so it's practically a non-starter. Low income housing benefits people who are low-income and will attract them as a result, and no city in the entire fuckin world has a financial incentive to cater to poor people, because they're, you know, poor. If they did we would have a ton more options for things like reliable and well priced public transit, not more bloody freeways.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> housing the middle class is always going to be more profitable than housing the poor You could make this argument for any product. Of course it’s more profitable to cook steaks for the rich. That doesn’t mean nobody poor has ever eaten. About one percent of Americans are poor on a global scale [1]. Unaffordability of housing is a political choice. It is driven by an alliance between cynical and ignorant interests. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_percentage_of_population_living_in_poverty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_...
- ToucanLoucan 3y ago
  > You could make this argument for any product. Yeah you can, because the vast majority of products are built and priced for the middle class, including > Of course it’s more profitable to cook steaks for the rich Food, which is why we have vast areas in the USA where it is impossible to buy groceries without driving 40 minutes or more, which means fresh food is basically out of the question, which is fine anyway because those people probably can't afford anything but over-processed calorie dense foods that store well. Because again: producing food is not done because people need food, it is done because it is profitable. Or in the case of food deserts, it is not done because it is substantially less profitable. Much like building low income housing. And Americans being rich on a global scale doesn't mean shit when median expenses for said "rich" Americans are getting more expensive all the time. Cars are basically entirely a poor tax on Americans, so yes, we all drive enormous and ridiculous vehicles, but those same vehicles are also slowly driving us all into fucking poverty because a century ago, the car companies killed any decent public transit in the vast majority of cities, and people like Robert Moses used building highways as a way to fuck over black people on a scale not seen since the abolishing of slavery. Our houses are certainly nicer than most people's too, which is why we're spending upwards of 1/3-1/2 of the money we make on them, oftentimes not even earning equity in the process: half the money you make, just dumped in a damn hole, never to be seen again. And each time the housing market crashes more of the supply ends up in the hands of banks and hedge funds, ensuring it'll be just as expensive in the future for us to pay to live in. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, almost like everything is doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing. You could live a comfortable lifestyle on an American full-time minimum wage in the Republic of Vanuatu, that's fucking irrelevant to everyone because no one who makes that wage lives there.
  - shuckles 3y ago
    I would be shocked if more than 1% of the population lived 40 minutes from the nearest grocery store out of necessity. Can you provide a citation? > And Americans being rich on a global scale doesn't mean shit when median expenses for said "rich" Americans are getting more expensive all the time. This is a political choice.
  - 3y ago
rendang 3y ago
I grew up in Tucson, a city full of garden apt complexes that in the 2000s charged $300-$600 for a one-bedroom apartment. All of them were built by private developers, owned by private mgmt companies, there were no rent control laws, and rents stayed pretty low there all the way up until the COVID demand shock. You aren't going to ever have cheap housing in a desirable urban core, but the vast land area of inner ring suburbs can house many more people if upzoned.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> housing the middle class is always going to be more profitable than housing the poor You could make this argument for any product. Of course it’s more profitable to cook steaks for the rich. That doesn’t mean nobody poor has ever eaten. About one percent of Americans are poor on a global scale [1]. Unaffordability of housing is a political choice. It is driven by an alliance between cynical and ignorant interests. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_percentage_of_population_living_in_poverty https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_...

ToucanLoucan 3y ago
> You could make this argument for any product. Yeah you can, because the vast majority of products are built and priced for the middle class, including > Of course it’s more profitable to cook steaks for the rich Food, which is why we have vast areas in the USA where it is impossible to buy groceries without driving 40 minutes or more, which means fresh food is basically out of the question, which is fine anyway because those people probably can't afford anything but over-processed calorie dense foods that store well. Because again: producing food is not done because people need food, it is done because it is profitable. Or in the case of food deserts, it is not done because it is substantially less profitable. Much like building low income housing. And Americans being rich on a global scale doesn't mean shit when median expenses for said "rich" Americans are getting more expensive all the time. Cars are basically entirely a poor tax on Americans, so yes, we all drive enormous and ridiculous vehicles, but those same vehicles are also slowly driving us all into fucking poverty because a century ago, the car companies killed any decent public transit in the vast majority of cities, and people like Robert Moses used building highways as a way to fuck over black people on a scale not seen since the abolishing of slavery. Our houses are certainly nicer than most people's too, which is why we're spending upwards of 1/3-1/2 of the money we make on them, oftentimes not even earning equity in the process: half the money you make, just dumped in a damn hole, never to be seen again. And each time the housing market crashes more of the supply ends up in the hands of banks and hedge funds, ensuring it'll be just as expensive in the future for us to pay to live in. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, almost like everything is doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing. You could live a comfortable lifestyle on an American full-time minimum wage in the Republic of Vanuatu, that's fucking irrelevant to everyone because no one who makes that wage lives there.
- shuckles 3y ago
  I would be shocked if more than 1% of the population lived 40 minutes from the nearest grocery store out of necessity. Can you provide a citation? > And Americans being rich on a global scale doesn't mean shit when median expenses for said "rich" Americans are getting more expensive all the time. This is a political choice.
- 3y ago

rendang 3y ago

I grew up in Tucson, a city full of garden apt complexes that in the 2000s charged $300-$600 for a one-bedroom apartment. All of them were built by private developers, owned by private mgmt companies, there were no rent control laws, and rents stayed pretty low there all the way up until the COVID demand shock. You aren't going to ever have cheap housing in a desirable urban core, but the vast land area of inner ring suburbs can house many more people if upzoned.