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> They hold a lease to temporarily occupy a residence that is the property of someone else. Nobody likes to frame it this way, but it's what's actually happenin

> They hold a lease to temporarily occupy a residence that is the property of someone else. Nobody likes to frame it this way, but it's what's actually happening. > Rent-control allows people to have their cake, and eat it too. It just comes at the price of creating a type of informal aristocracy. So somebody who inherited property which their grandparent bought 40 years ago (for super cheap) and never had to worry about anything because of that is OK. But laws that try to limit speculation and exploitation of people who were not so lucky… that is creating informal aristocracy. Sorry to break it to you but the aristocracies are already in place and rent control is one of ways how societies try to tackle them. I personaly dont think rent control is very effective one but somebody is atleast trying to do something.

emmacharp 3y ago
Well said.
scoofy 3y ago
I'm not here to argue "capitalism good" ... I'm here to argue that indefinite rent-control is not only an ineffective solution at solving the very problem it intends to solve (it makes it worst), but it also morally objectionable from a Rawlsian perspective. As I said before: >If we want to deal with inequality in housing, we need to deal with the monetary inequality So when you say things like: >So somebody who inherited property which their grandparent bought 40 years ago (for super cheap) and never had to worry about anything because of that is OK. I'm confused, because the issue of property ownership and inheritance is it's own issue. Trying to solve the property ownership problem with a make-shift scheme like perpetual rent control, again, makes things worse. This problem is notable, and particularly tricky, because the soviet union (urban russia, afaik), had housing problems very similar to the ones of Stockholm on account of the fact that it was politically unpopular to redevelop city centers to increase housing capacity, and instead you get large undesirable housing blocs on the outer edges of cities, simply because all the incumbents wanted to keep their valuable properties, even though they weren't technically owned. The problem of unaffordable housing is solved by creating and incentivizing oversupply.

emmacharp 3y ago

Well said.

scoofy 3y ago

I'm not here to argue "capitalism good" ... I'm here to argue that indefinite rent-control is not only an ineffective solution at solving the very problem it intends to solve (it makes it worst), but it also morally objectionable from a Rawlsian perspective. As I said before: >If we want to deal with inequality in housing, we need to deal with the monetary inequality So when you say things like: >So somebody who inherited property which their grandparent bought 40 years ago (for super cheap) and never had to worry about anything because of that is OK. I'm confused, because the issue of property ownership and inheritance is it's own issue. Trying to solve the property ownership problem with a make-shift scheme like perpetual rent control, again, makes things worse. This problem is notable, and particularly tricky, because the soviet union (urban russia, afaik), had housing problems very similar to the ones of Stockholm on account of the fact that it was politically unpopular to redevelop city centers to increase housing capacity, and instead you get large undesirable housing blocs on the outer edges of cities, simply because all the incumbents wanted to keep their valuable properties, even though they weren't technically owned. The problem of unaffordable housing is solved by creating and incentivizing oversupply.