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> The sharpest criticisms of the book Abundance have sometimes come from the antitrust movement. This group, mostly on the left, insists that the biggest proble

> The sharpest criticisms of the book Abundance have sometimes come from the antitrust movement. This group, mostly on the left, insists that the biggest problems in America typically come from monopolies and the corruption of big business. ctrl-F "RealPage" - nothing. hmm. ctrl-F "rent" - also nothing. really? from about a year ago: Justice Department Sues RealPage for Algorithmic Pricing Scheme that Harms Millions of American Renters [0] > The Justice Department, together with the Attorneys General of North Carolina, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, Oregon, Tennessee, and Washington, filed a civil antitrust lawsuit today against RealPage Inc. for its unlawful scheme to decrease competition among landlords in apartment pricing and to monopolize the market for commercial revenue management software that landlords use to price apartments. > ... > Another landlord commented about RealPage’s product, “I always liked this product because your algorithm uses proprietary data from other subscribers to suggest rents and term. That’s classic price fixing…” if I hear about antitrust in the context of housing policy, RealPage making it easier for apartment buildings to collude on rent prices is the very first thing that leaps to mind. it seems like Thompson is being awfully selective about which antitrust-related criticisms he's responding to here. he seems to be focusing exclusively on building single-family homes, and completely ignoring the concrete example of monopoly power being used for apartment rentals, and antitrust laws being used to address that. 0: https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-realpage-algorithmic-pricing-scheme-harms-millions-american-renters https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/justice-department-s...

freddie_mercury 1y ago
Thompson is responding to a specific paper. 'One of the most detailed articles in this space is an analysis of the Dallas, Texas, housing market by the lawyer and writer Basel Musharbash. In “Messing With Texas: How Big Homebuilders and Private Equity Made American Cities Unaffordable”' Musharbash doesn't mention RealPage either, so go blame him, since he doesn't think RealPage contributes to Dallas's problems.
- smcg 1y ago
  Thompson writes these articles to deflect valid criticism.
- evil-olive 1y ago
  > Thompson is responding to a specific paper. yes, he's responding to [0] which was written by Musharbash and published in Matt Stoller's newsletter. and as I said, he's being selective about what criticism he's responding to and what he's ignoring. because Stoller has also published, in the same newsletter, articles about RealPage price fixing [1, 2]. Thompson says: > The antitrust left, however, claims... if he's going to say "here's what the antitrust left believes" and then proceed to debunk it, I think it's reasonable to point out that his response is cherry-picking only part of what that "antitrust left" believes. of course, if he wants to publish a follow-up article defending RealPage, I'd love to read it. 0: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/messing-with-texas-how-big-homebuilders https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/messing-with-texas-how-bi... 1: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/antitrust-enforcers-the-rent-is-too https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/antitrust-enforcers-the-r... 2: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/up-to-a-quarter-of-rental-inflation https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/up-to-a-quarter-of-rental...
  - tptacek 1y ago
    It's not on him to rebut every single argument Stoller has ever made. Several arguments Stoller made were refuted by the authorities Stoller himself cited, which is both interesting to read and also telling. Stoller is free to find similarly decisive refutations of arguments Thompson had made (they're unlikely to be forthcoming).
    - whoknowsidont 1y ago
      >Several arguments Stoller made were refuted by the authorities Stoller himself cited That's not true. At all. That's what Thompson _claims_. Look at what was actually written. It's incredibly sleazy writing. It's so one-sided it might as well be a celebrity gossip magazine piece.
      - tptacek 1y ago
        I feel like not a lot of celebrity gossip consists of calls with economics professors who wrote cited papers discussing those citations, but we might just read different rags.
radixdiaboli 1y ago
> it seems like Thompson is being awfully selective about which antitrust-related criticisms he's responding to here He was responding to a specific critique of his book. So... yes. That's how that works.
jeffbee 1y ago
Can you cite some evidence of a place where RealPage's supposed power has led to a consumer harm like higher rents? I may be biased because my research has been cited by RealPage in their suit against the city of Berkeley, but to me RealPage just finds the market clearing price, and that's not particularly evil in my book.
nradov 1y ago
Collusion among landlords can only work in a housing shortage. With an abundance of rental units, individual landlords would "defect" (in a game theory sense) and lower rents in order to fill their vacant units at the market price.
- nielsbot 1y ago
  Don't we have a housing shortage? Also, many (institutional?) landlords are happy to leave units vacant and/or evict tenants spuriously for higher profits.
  - tptacek 1y ago
    Explain the economics of keeping units vacant in the face of increasing supply.
    - whoknowsidont 1y ago
      Maybe read the referenced article?
  - diziet_sma 1y ago
    Yes we do. The OP's point is that _if_ there is collusion, building housing will help solve the collusion problem _and_ solve the housing shortage. Spending effort on theoretical collusion which may or may not be happening is a diversion from the real problem, which is lack of housing supply.
davidw 1y ago
I wish everyone who cares about the price of housing could go to a hearing like this one. Sadly, they happen in every community so if you're curious, you ought to go: https://bendyimby.com/2024/04/16/the-hearing-and-the-housing-shortage/ https://bendyimby.com/2024/04/16/the-hearing-and-the-housing... That is your housing shortage right there. Now, Real page probably jacks up prices a bit. A bit multiplied by a lot of renters means real harm and it was probably worth taking them to court over. However, at the end of the day, RealPage is simply not enough to get Los Angeles rents out of Houston property. Supply and demand are still where it's at.
- thegrim33 1y ago
  You're claiming that your idea of 'X' is true, and for evidence of this, you're linking to a site that was created by people whose mission is to advocate for the idea of X. Am I likely to be getting an impartial view of the situation from a source which solely exists to push X-related messaging? Is such a group/site really going to give a fair shake to other theories Y and Z, or to conflicting data?
  - NoahZuniga 1y ago
    "You're claiming X is true, and providing me with a source you believe has good arguments for X being true. Very suspicious."
  - Schiendelman 1y ago
    If you start digging into this issue you'll find every example you want. If you only challenge people you disagree with, you will remain wrong.
  - davidw 1y ago
    I care about fixing the housing shortage in the city I live in. I spend hundreds of hours as a volunteer, see a lot and read a lot. I'm pointing out what I see on the ground doing the work. And what I see is NIMBYs, not institutional investors or RealPage or 'foreigners' or whatever else the bogeyman du jour is. If I were convinced the problem lay elsewhere, I would focus on that, because I don't have anything invested in the problem being a specific thing.

freddie_mercury 1y ago

Thompson is responding to a specific paper. 'One of the most detailed articles in this space is an analysis of the Dallas, Texas, housing market by the lawyer and writer Basel Musharbash. In “Messing With Texas: How Big Homebuilders and Private Equity Made American Cities Unaffordable”' Musharbash doesn't mention RealPage either, so go blame him, since he doesn't think RealPage contributes to Dallas's problems.

smcg 1y ago
Thompson writes these articles to deflect valid criticism.
evil-olive 1y ago
> Thompson is responding to a specific paper. yes, he's responding to [0] which was written by Musharbash and published in Matt Stoller's newsletter. and as I said, he's being selective about what criticism he's responding to and what he's ignoring. because Stoller has also published, in the same newsletter, articles about RealPage price fixing [1, 2]. Thompson says: > The antitrust left, however, claims... if he's going to say "here's what the antitrust left believes" and then proceed to debunk it, I think it's reasonable to point out that his response is cherry-picking only part of what that "antitrust left" believes. of course, if he wants to publish a follow-up article defending RealPage, I'd love to read it. 0: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/messing-with-texas-how-big-homebuilders https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/messing-with-texas-how-bi... 1: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/antitrust-enforcers-the-rent-is-too https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/antitrust-enforcers-the-r... 2: https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/up-to-a-quarter-of-rental-inflation https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/up-to-a-quarter-of-rental...
- tptacek 1y ago
  It's not on him to rebut every single argument Stoller has ever made. Several arguments Stoller made were refuted by the authorities Stoller himself cited, which is both interesting to read and also telling. Stoller is free to find similarly decisive refutations of arguments Thompson had made (they're unlikely to be forthcoming).
  - whoknowsidont 1y ago
    >Several arguments Stoller made were refuted by the authorities Stoller himself cited That's not true. At all. That's what Thompson _claims_. Look at what was actually written. It's incredibly sleazy writing. It's so one-sided it might as well be a celebrity gossip magazine piece.
    - tptacek 1y ago
      I feel like not a lot of celebrity gossip consists of calls with economics professors who wrote cited papers discussing those citations, but we might just read different rags.

radixdiaboli 1y ago

> it seems like Thompson is being awfully selective about which antitrust-related criticisms he's responding to here He was responding to a specific critique of his book. So... yes. That's how that works.

jeffbee 1y ago

Can you cite some evidence of a place where RealPage's supposed power has led to a consumer harm like higher rents? I may be biased because my research has been cited by RealPage in their suit against the city of Berkeley, but to me RealPage just finds the market clearing price, and that's not particularly evil in my book.

nradov 1y ago

Collusion among landlords can only work in a housing shortage. With an abundance of rental units, individual landlords would "defect" (in a game theory sense) and lower rents in order to fill their vacant units at the market price.

nielsbot 1y ago
Don't we have a housing shortage? Also, many (institutional?) landlords are happy to leave units vacant and/or evict tenants spuriously for higher profits.
- tptacek 1y ago
  Explain the economics of keeping units vacant in the face of increasing supply.
  - whoknowsidont 1y ago
    Maybe read the referenced article?
- diziet_sma 1y ago
  Yes we do. The OP's point is that _if_ there is collusion, building housing will help solve the collusion problem _and_ solve the housing shortage. Spending effort on theoretical collusion which may or may not be happening is a diversion from the real problem, which is lack of housing supply.

davidw 1y ago

I wish everyone who cares about the price of housing could go to a hearing like this one. Sadly, they happen in every community so if you're curious, you ought to go: https://bendyimby.com/2024/04/16/the-hearing-and-the-housing-shortage/ https://bendyimby.com/2024/04/16/the-hearing-and-the-housing... That is your housing shortage right there. Now, Real page probably jacks up prices a bit. A bit multiplied by a lot of renters means real harm and it was probably worth taking them to court over. However, at the end of the day, RealPage is simply not enough to get Los Angeles rents out of Houston property. Supply and demand are still where it's at.

thegrim33 1y ago
You're claiming that your idea of 'X' is true, and for evidence of this, you're linking to a site that was created by people whose mission is to advocate for the idea of X. Am I likely to be getting an impartial view of the situation from a source which solely exists to push X-related messaging? Is such a group/site really going to give a fair shake to other theories Y and Z, or to conflicting data?
- NoahZuniga 1y ago
  "You're claiming X is true, and providing me with a source you believe has good arguments for X being true. Very suspicious."
- Schiendelman 1y ago
  If you start digging into this issue you'll find every example you want. If you only challenge people you disagree with, you will remain wrong.
- davidw 1y ago
  I care about fixing the housing shortage in the city I live in. I spend hundreds of hours as a volunteer, see a lot and read a lot. I'm pointing out what I see on the ground doing the work. And what I see is NIMBYs, not institutional investors or RealPage or 'foreigners' or whatever else the bogeyman du jour is. If I were convinced the problem lay elsewhere, I would focus on that, because I don't have anything invested in the problem being a specific thing.