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Renting could decouple "home" from "house," allowing everyone to behave more rationally and giving the middle class better real estate portfolio diversification
by arebop 18y ago
Renting could decouple "home" from "house," allowing everyone to behave more rationally and giving the middle class better real estate portfolio diversification.
This doesn't require a People's Barracks. It could be done privately, merely by introducing a layer of indirection between individuals and housing stock.
I see a few problems with this idea. First, given the opportunity to behave more rationally, will most people act on it? Second, it doesn't fully decouple "home" from a physical place. It doesn't address the social environment of family and friends, or the costs of moving one's belongings. My other worry is acknowledged in the article but sort of dismissed: "homeownership has some social benefits—a higher level of civic engagement is one."
- gaius 18y agoRational behaviour is, in a way, the problem. When New Labour came to power in the UK in the late 1990s, Gordon Brown launched a raid on the pension funds to fuel his extravagant spending plans. Workers in the UK then identified a need for an alternative asset class to save for retirement, as the previously sacrosanct pensions were now seen by the government as a cash cow. Property was the preferred option, and everyone piled into that market. But what were people supposed to do differently?