6 ms·

The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is

by abduhl 2y ago

The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?

asoneth 2y ago
> tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. > why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? For one thing, governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown. If a sufficiently large percentage of the population believes that their living standards are declining (including not having a place to live) then an increasing number of people will arrive at the conclusion that revolution or terrorism has a positive risk/reward ratio. I've worked in a country where the previous government had allowed this to occur; apparently it happened gradually and then suddenly. Beyond a certain point you can only consider something "my building" if you have the means to defend it against anyone who might wish to make it their building. In that case, the possession of a piece of paper which you once used to outsource the enforcement of your property rights to the previous government isn't very useful. (Edit: To be clear, I think allowing squatting is a poor solution to the problem of reducing homelessness and better tax and housing policies are more sustainable and equitable, I'm just explaining why the government has a substantial interest in what private landowners do with their properties.)
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- abduhl 2y ago
  >> I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. Vacant land use taxes do make sense to me. That is not what GP advocated for: “Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.” Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. >> governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown This is a tortuous chain of logic to go from unoccupied buildings to overthrown government concerns.
  - asoneth 2y ago
    > That is not what GP advocated for Right, that's why before I responded to your question ("why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?") I tried to make it clear that I think there are better approaches than what the GP was advocating for i.e. directly seizing vacant properties. > This is a tortuous chain of logic to get from building with squatters to government overthrown. Can you be more specific about what part you disagree with? To be clear, I'm not arguing that squatting results in overthrown governments, but that the acceptance of widespread squatting is sometimes a (shortsighted) policy response to a housing crisis. Squatting is a symptom but what can actually topple governments is sufficiently high levels of homelessness. Any government that allows a sufficiently large percentage of residents (especially young people) to become homeless will eventually be replaced by anarchy or a new government. To reiterate, I'm just trying to answer your question of what right the government has to tell you what to do with your property -- I'm not specifically defending the GP's suggestion.
  - tivert 2y ago
    > Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. That's a distinction without a difference, at least not a difference in the area we're talking about. Both mechanisms cause title to be lost if certain obligations are not met (in one case, an obligation to occupy, in the other, an obligation to pay taxes).
    - abduhl 2y ago
      Well if we zoom out to the moon so that everything looks the same “in the area we are talking about” then I guess there are no distinctions between anything, are there? A person that gets robbed is the same as a person that forgets their wallet on a train, they both just failed to meet their obligations (in one case an obligation to not let someone have their wallet and in the other their obligation to remember where they put their wallet).
  - revert_to_test 2y ago
    Maybe government won't be overthrown, but you can easily loose the election. European cities are dense, and there is limit to their growth, as they are often surrounded by tight circles of villages. Sure, you can build a few buildings there, but those villages are often fighting against high buildings, and residents often fight against urbanisation of the area. So you can't build suburbs like in USA and this makes the already problematic situation (high prices, big funds buying whole apartment complexes to rent them, many people buying apartments as assets and being afraid of renting due to protections towards tenants) even worse. So every building is worth it's weight in gold. And whole abandoned buying is going to be a daily reminder for many people that cannot afford to buy 1 room apartment about how unfair current situation is. I don't want to argue about what to do with situation, just adding a perspective.
skitout 2y ago
Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people. Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...
- abduhl 2y ago
  You do have a right to do a metal concert in your living room on Saturday at 1AM. You don’t have a right to violate the local noise ordinance or, because your example has you as an apartment owner and not a building owner, the condo association rules. You do have the right to paint your frontage the way you want with respect to the GOVERNMENT. But more importantly, the GP wanted the government to TAKE VIA FORFEITURE any building that is merely vacant. Your examples are limits on use, not relinquishment of property. They are not the same.
  - vidarh 2y ago
    There isn't a government on the planet which doesn't place limits on how you can paint your property. Try painting a death threat against a government official on it for example. The notion that property rights is unlimited is an extremist view that doesn't match the legal situation in any jurisdiction on the planet with a government.
tivert 2y ago
>> What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property. > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. It is not an extremist view. It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Squatters rights can be a solution to that (e.g. in the US, squatters can actually get title to the land in cases of long-term abandonment). > Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? This is actually the extremist view, private property rights do not trump all other considerations. For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food.
- abduhl 2y ago
  >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Then the government should buy the land. >> For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food. Let’s not use other examples and argumentation by analogy when we already have a very clear fact pattern. You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why?
  - tivert 2y ago
    >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. > Then the government should buy the land. No, I don't think so. > You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why? Yes. The legal principle has a long, long history across many different legal systems. And I think you're thinking about it wrong: the government didn't "make you surrender that building," you chose to surrender it by leaving it unoccupied and unused to the point someone else could occupy and use it without a timely challenge.
TulliusCicero 2y ago
> The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? No, but they have to keep it in good condition, which includes keeping it secure.
vidarh 2y ago
Land is a scarce resource, and society agrees to enforce artificial restrictions on access and use because in many instances it is beneficial, but that does not mean society should automatically be required to extend unlimited support for property claims when an owner behaves in ways detrimental to society as a whole. No jurisdiction on earth grants property rights without limitations.

by abduhl 2y ago

asoneth 2y ago

> tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. > why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? For one thing, governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown. If a sufficiently large percentage of the population believes that their living standards are declining (including not having a place to live) then an increasing number of people will arrive at the conclusion that revolution or terrorism has a positive risk/reward ratio. I've worked in a country where the previous government had allowed this to occur; apparently it happened gradually and then suddenly. Beyond a certain point you can only consider something "my building" if you have the means to defend it against anyone who might wish to make it their building. In that case, the possession of a piece of paper which you once used to outsource the enforcement of your property rights to the previous government isn't very useful. (Edit: To be clear, I think allowing squatting is a poor solution to the problem of reducing homelessness and better tax and housing policies are more sustainable and equitable, I'm just explaining why the government has a substantial interest in what private landowners do with their properties.)

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
abduhl 2y ago
>> I suspect it would make more sense to do so via tax policy, i.e. high property taxes (or LVT) with a deduction for each occupant. Vacant land use taxes do make sense to me. That is not what GP advocated for: “Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property.” Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. >> governments have a vested interest in not being overthrown This is a tortuous chain of logic to go from unoccupied buildings to overthrown government concerns.
- asoneth 2y ago
  > That is not what GP advocated for Right, that's why before I responded to your question ("why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building?") I tried to make it clear that I think there are better approaches than what the GP was advocating for i.e. directly seizing vacant properties. > This is a tortuous chain of logic to get from building with squatters to government overthrown. Can you be more specific about what part you disagree with? To be clear, I'm not arguing that squatting results in overthrown governments, but that the acceptance of widespread squatting is sometimes a (shortsighted) policy response to a housing crisis. Squatting is a symptom but what can actually topple governments is sufficiently high levels of homelessness. Any government that allows a sufficiently large percentage of residents (especially young people) to become homeless will eventually be replaced by anarchy or a new government. To reiterate, I'm just trying to answer your question of what right the government has to tell you what to do with your property -- I'm not specifically defending the GP's suggestion.
- tivert 2y ago
  > Increased taxation is not forfeiture, and being forced to sell because taxes are prohibitive is different from the government taking your building. That's a distinction without a difference, at least not a difference in the area we're talking about. Both mechanisms cause title to be lost if certain obligations are not met (in one case, an obligation to occupy, in the other, an obligation to pay taxes).
  - abduhl 2y ago
    Well if we zoom out to the moon so that everything looks the same “in the area we are talking about” then I guess there are no distinctions between anything, are there? A person that gets robbed is the same as a person that forgets their wallet on a train, they both just failed to meet their obligations (in one case an obligation to not let someone have their wallet and in the other their obligation to remember where they put their wallet).
- revert_to_test 2y ago
  Maybe government won't be overthrown, but you can easily loose the election. European cities are dense, and there is limit to their growth, as they are often surrounded by tight circles of villages. Sure, you can build a few buildings there, but those villages are often fighting against high buildings, and residents often fight against urbanisation of the area. So you can't build suburbs like in USA and this makes the already problematic situation (high prices, big funds buying whole apartment complexes to rent them, many people buying apartments as assets and being afraid of renting due to protections towards tenants) even worse. So every building is worth it's weight in gold. And whole abandoned buying is going to be a daily reminder for many people that cannot afford to buy 1 room apartment about how unfair current situation is. I don't want to argue about what to do with situation, just adding a perspective.

skitout 2y ago

Even if I am the owner of an apartment, I don't have the right to do a metal concert in my living room some Saturdays at 1 am... or don't have the right to paint my frontage the way I want... cause it creates negative consequences for other people. Having vacant apartments and houses for long time in places where there is an housing shortage create much bigger negative consequences than few metal concerts...

abduhl 2y ago
You do have a right to do a metal concert in your living room on Saturday at 1AM. You don’t have a right to violate the local noise ordinance or, because your example has you as an apartment owner and not a building owner, the condo association rules. You do have the right to paint your frontage the way you want with respect to the GOVERNMENT. But more importantly, the GP wanted the government to TAKE VIA FORFEITURE any building that is merely vacant. Your examples are limits on use, not relinquishment of property. They are not the same.
- vidarh 2y ago
  There isn't a government on the planet which doesn't place limits on how you can paint your property. Try painting a death threat against a government official on it for example. The notion that property rights is unlimited is an extremist view that doesn't match the legal situation in any jurisdiction on the planet with a government.

tivert 2y ago

>> What's madness is the state allowing property owners to leave vacant, dilapidated buildings to blight the neighborhood. Owners should be required to maintain their structures and keep them occupied, or forfeit the property. > The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? This is an extremist view. It is not an extremist view. It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Squatters rights can be a solution to that (e.g. in the US, squatters can actually get title to the land in cases of long-term abandonment). > Who defines what “maintained” means? Beyond safety concerns about the structure (and even then, they shouldn’t be able to tell me anything as long as I post a danger unsafe structure keep out sign and lock the doors), why would the government have any right to tell me what to do with my building? This is actually the extremist view, private property rights do not trump all other considerations. For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food.

abduhl 2y ago
>> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. Then the government should buy the land. >> For a very clear example: if you're surrounded by starving people, and you own a warehouse full of food that you plan to let rot because you can't be bothered, the government absolutely does have the right to tell you what to do with that food. Let’s not use other examples and argumentation by analogy when we already have a very clear fact pattern. You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why?
- tivert 2y ago
  >> It's a public policy failure for land to sit vacant like that. > Then the government should buy the land. No, I don't think so. > You own a building and the building is not currently occupied. The building is unsightly but structurally sound. Does/should the government have the right to make you surrender that building without compensation (because that’s what forfeit means) simply due to it being unoccupied? Why? Yes. The legal principle has a long, long history across many different legal systems. And I think you're thinking about it wrong: the government didn't "make you surrender that building," you chose to surrender it by leaving it unoccupied and unused to the point someone else could occupy and use it without a timely challenge.

TulliusCicero 2y ago

> The government should tell property owners that they are required to keep their property occupied otherwise the government should seize their property? No, but they have to keep it in good condition, which includes keeping it secure.

vidarh 2y ago

Land is a scarce resource, and society agrees to enforce artificial restrictions on access and use because in many instances it is beneficial, but that does not mean society should automatically be required to extend unlimited support for property claims when an owner behaves in ways detrimental to society as a whole. No jurisdiction on earth grants property rights without limitations.