4 ms·

Turns out capital without borders ruins prices for scarce things (like housing) everywhere.

mentalgear 2y ago
Housing is a fundamental human right. Corporations should not be allowed to buy or hold large amounts of residential property or zoned housing land. They create artificial scarcity by holding it back, driving up prices purely for profit. A less direct but still effective approach is to restrict residential property purchases to citizens. This helps prevent international hedge funds and (sovereign) wealth-funds from monopolizing the housing market. Some of the most affordable housing markets in the world, such as Austria, implement these policies—alongside strong state-led housing initiatives.
- whatever1 2y ago
  Rich people have smart folks whose job is to think ways to avoid regulation. In your example they would probably just have puppet citizens who buy land on their behalf. Sure the cost would be a bit higher because the puppets would demand some commission, but hey it’s the cost of running business. It’s close to impossible to regulate concentrated money. See the drug cartels or Musk as two examples. The cartels operate their own army in South America completely ignoring government regulation. Musk bought an entire gov for himself.
  - mentalgear 2y ago
    While I can understand your cynicism, and I know the reality of loopholes, it would make it much harder. Also, consider the more "puppets" needed, they less stable the system becomes, and the more likely a "puppet" exposes the system (as whistleblowers in the mafia). In any case, the thinking can't be "it's too hard, we can't do anything anyhow" because then society is really f-ed and the rich get what they want: hopelessness and conformity. Again, there are examples of northern & Scandinavian countries that did this with great results. It's just a matter of pushing through.
- nec4b 2y ago
  >> Housing is a fundamental human right. No it's not. A fundamental human freedom is to build or to buy a house. Nobody is owned a house.
  - mentalgear 2y ago
    Please read: We are talking about housing, which is not ownership.
torpfactory 2y ago
I’d argue most of the cost of scare housing is supply limits imposed by ridiculous over regulation of new construction. It’s not like we forgot how to build houses and apartments we just aren’t allowed to.
- whatever1 2y ago
  Nah, 2d space is finite. If you flood an “island” (desirable location) with demand then prices can only go up. We are building skyscrapers in manhattan for over a century so what? Rent is still $5k and $1000 per sq ft to buy.
  - daemoens 2y ago
    It doesn't matter if you build skyscrapers for over a century if you don't build enough of them. The only places in the country where rent is actually going down is where housing is actually being built in any significant numbers. Austin builds more homes in a week than San Fransisco does in an entire year. Rent is 5k because the supply isn't meeting the amount of demand.
- ty6853 2y ago
  This is 1000% true. Owner builder DIY building is basically unregulated where I live. I built a 600 sq ft house for like $40,000 last year. I have a plan that works, but either no one believes me or they spend all their time looking for ways that it fails rather than how they can succeed.
- 9rx 2y ago
  Even if you could build as you please, the labour costs still make up the large marjory of the cost of the home. There isn't a whole lot of room for the costs to come down. That is unless you destroy the price of labour... Which undoing the global economy will help with.
  - ty6853 2y ago
    When I bought my land the #1 driver of cost was either covenants (basically irreversible burden written by now dead boomers in the 80s who were furious someone would build anything but a mansion next to their mobile home pig farm) or zoning. I knew I needed to build as small as possible to keep prices down, so I had to find a needle in a haystack of someplace without onerous covenants or zoning but with some way to establish or create utilities. Everyone was wanting 1000+ sq ft houses on their vacant desert shithole land. Just water and electric can be a nightmare. I lucked out buying an unproven already drilled old well that was grandfathered in, but if not you have to deal with hoping you'll be allowed to drill or access water and costly regulation for that. Same story with electric. I finally got it, after paying the coop to run new poles down the road, but only after a long fight with another company that kept asking for endless paperwork and expensive surveys that they later admitted weren't even needed. And then there is septic. I found a guy who used to be the county inspector to navigate that for me, but without connections you can get yanked around into all sorts of expensive hurdles or overengineering. And this is all before you even break ground.

Housing is a fundamental human right. Corporations should not be allowed to buy or hold large amounts of residential property or zoned housing land. They create artificial scarcity by holding it back, driving up prices purely for profit. A less direct but still effective approach is to restrict residential property purchases to citizens. This helps prevent international hedge funds and (sovereign) wealth-funds from monopolizing the housing market. Some of the most affordable housing markets in the world, such as Austria, implement these policies—alongside strong state-led housing initiatives.

whatever1 2y ago
Rich people have smart folks whose job is to think ways to avoid regulation. In your example they would probably just have puppet citizens who buy land on their behalf. Sure the cost would be a bit higher because the puppets would demand some commission, but hey it’s the cost of running business. It’s close to impossible to regulate concentrated money. See the drug cartels or Musk as two examples. The cartels operate their own army in South America completely ignoring government regulation. Musk bought an entire gov for himself.
- mentalgear 2y ago
  While I can understand your cynicism, and I know the reality of loopholes, it would make it much harder. Also, consider the more "puppets" needed, they less stable the system becomes, and the more likely a "puppet" exposes the system (as whistleblowers in the mafia). In any case, the thinking can't be "it's too hard, we can't do anything anyhow" because then society is really f-ed and the rich get what they want: hopelessness and conformity. Again, there are examples of northern & Scandinavian countries that did this with great results. It's just a matter of pushing through.
nec4b 2y ago
>> Housing is a fundamental human right. No it's not. A fundamental human freedom is to build or to buy a house. Nobody is owned a house.
- mentalgear 2y ago
  Please read: We are talking about housing, which is not ownership.

torpfactory 2y ago

I’d argue most of the cost of scare housing is supply limits imposed by ridiculous over regulation of new construction. It’s not like we forgot how to build houses and apartments we just aren’t allowed to.

whatever1 2y ago
Nah, 2d space is finite. If you flood an “island” (desirable location) with demand then prices can only go up. We are building skyscrapers in manhattan for over a century so what? Rent is still $5k and $1000 per sq ft to buy.
- daemoens 2y ago
  It doesn't matter if you build skyscrapers for over a century if you don't build enough of them. The only places in the country where rent is actually going down is where housing is actually being built in any significant numbers. Austin builds more homes in a week than San Fransisco does in an entire year. Rent is 5k because the supply isn't meeting the amount of demand.
ty6853 2y ago
This is 1000% true. Owner builder DIY building is basically unregulated where I live. I built a 600 sq ft house for like $40,000 last year. I have a plan that works, but either no one believes me or they spend all their time looking for ways that it fails rather than how they can succeed.
9rx 2y ago
Even if you could build as you please, the labour costs still make up the large marjory of the cost of the home. There isn't a whole lot of room for the costs to come down. That is unless you destroy the price of labour... Which undoing the global economy will help with.
- ty6853 2y ago
  When I bought my land the #1 driver of cost was either covenants (basically irreversible burden written by now dead boomers in the 80s who were furious someone would build anything but a mansion next to their mobile home pig farm) or zoning. I knew I needed to build as small as possible to keep prices down, so I had to find a needle in a haystack of someplace without onerous covenants or zoning but with some way to establish or create utilities. Everyone was wanting 1000+ sq ft houses on their vacant desert shithole land. Just water and electric can be a nightmare. I lucked out buying an unproven already drilled old well that was grandfathered in, but if not you have to deal with hoping you'll be allowed to drill or access water and costly regulation for that. Same story with electric. I finally got it, after paying the coop to run new poles down the road, but only after a long fight with another company that kept asking for endless paperwork and expensive surveys that they later admitted weren't even needed. And then there is septic. I found a guy who used to be the county inspector to navigate that for me, but without connections you can get yanked around into all sorts of expensive hurdles or overengineering. And this is all before you even break ground.