4 ms·

An alternative view is that rooms like these would be a lot more feasible if market pricing of real estate was not being artificially driven up by planning rest

An alternative view is that rooms like these would be a lot more feasible if market pricing of real estate was not being artificially driven up by planning restrictions. Historically, communities were able to afford their own versions of this in their own localities, but this isn’t possible anymore because of property prices. There was a community hall where I grew up that was funded like this along with a local sports club, and I’ve lived in a few North American cities where there are still community club/social houses for different groups (and not just wealthy ones) that were built decades ago.

cousin_it 4mo ago
Well, the planning restrictions don't just come from nowhere. People pay for them (with their lobbying time, lost rent and so on) because they want them. There's a market for "no poors in the neighborhood", an unpleasant market, but a market nonetheless. Add to that the fact that there's plenty of cheap housing in places with no jobs. So, what should we do? Should we fight against the "no poors in the neighborhood" market in rich cities? Or should we make more jobs appear in other cheaper places instead? I don't know the answer, to be honest.
- bluGill 4mo ago
  > There's a market for "no poors in the neighborhood", an unpleasant market, but a market nonetheless. I place freedom as a higher value than the market. Thus while I recognize that market exists, I don't allow anyone to serve it. Your ability to keep poor people away ends at your property line. They can walk on the sidewalks in front of your house because roads (a sidewalk is just another road) are not your property. They can live in a shack because that isn't your property and so you can't control what they do on it. Freedom isn't absolute. They are not allowed to release poison into the air just because of freedom (unless they can keep that entirely to their property - which ends not far above their buildings since airplanes get their own roads above their house)
  - cousin_it 4mo ago
    You're simplifying to the point of nonsense. Freedom you say? How about the freedom to have a say in government of the place you're living in? That seems a pretty fundamental freedom. When the rich folks of a town vote for planning restrictions and the vote goes through, that's an expression of freedom. Sure, we both don't like it. We both agree it has bad consequences. But what I'm trying to say is that there's a real want backed by serious money. One way or another, it will create a market (maybe a shadow market). Rich folks will always want "no poors in the neighborhood" and will keep trying to find ways to spend money to ensure it. They'll never give up. That's why I'm trying to think of solutions that don't require arm-wrestling one market vs another. For example, if we somehow created jobs elsewhere so that poor people wouldn't have to fight rich people for city air, then maybe that could work too.
    - bluGill 4mo ago
      I place strong restrictions on what I allow my governments to control. You get a say in your local government, but that government only has limited things it is allowed to control/do.
      - amanaplanacanal 4mo ago
        Allowing local government to restrict what can be built and where has been a double edged sword. Yes it's good that you can't build noisy, smelly, or potentially polluting activities near where people live. But we have gone far beyond that, in ways that harm our communities, require people to own a car to get through daily life, and leave people sleeping in the street. Some places are taking baby steps in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go.
    - eszed 4mo ago
      > if we somehow created jobs elsewhere so that poor people wouldn't have to fight rich people for city air Or, maybe... a VAT-funded UBI?
      - 4mo ago
- rjsw 4mo ago
  Pay UBI only at the level needed to live in the place with no jobs and cheap housing.
- em-bee 4mo ago
  segregating poor people into their own area is a sure way to make them stay poor. i believe there is evidence that the best way to help people out of poverty is to let them live in mixed areas where they have a chance to associate with people who are better off than them. i believe the primary reason is that even if you work hard to improve your life, as long as everyone around you remains poor then you are limited or are self limiting in how much you can actually achieve.
- xg15 4mo ago
  I mean, one of the main takeaways from the article was that "there is a market for X" is something fundamentally different and sometimes even the opposite of "X is a good thing".
InsideOutSanta 4mo ago
This leads to another problem: markets externalize many costs, which is why regulation exists. Sure, you could let "the economy" build as much as it wants without any regulation, but at what cost?
derektank 4mo ago
Does Sweden have a problem with local land use restrictions? They have done a lot to liberalize their economy over the last few decades
- occz 4mo ago
  Municipalities have far-reaching power in deciding what gets built where. Getting things built can take quite a long time.
DroneBetter 4mo ago
also just as importantly (or moreso for cases of individual rooms used for social/hobbyist clubs like this) would be 'empty building taxes' to prevent the eventuality of landlords preferring to rent out fewer properties over reducing the cost of vacant ones because * housing is necessary for survival so people cannot afford to baulk at the prices of artificial scarcity, making the optimal price effectively arbitrarily high without regulation * landlords are generally not infinitesimal entities in a vacuum, and generally stand to lose existing customers who are still on the expensive contracts if they cheapen their unoccupied offerings although such a solution would just move the problem one layer further up (stop building properties to have them be vacant) and the solution is land tax
xg15 4mo ago
Not an American, so maybe I'm underestimating the insanity of US zoning laws, but I always thought "residental ares" means "no businesses". Admittedly unpleasant if it means there can't be any grocery store or even café reachable by foot, but at least I get the rationale. But if the zoning restriction is "absolutely nothing except single-family homes", this becomes insane. So even if there is a local neighborhood who would like to build a sports field or a community center, they can't because of zoning? This makes no sense for me at all.
- hollerith 4mo ago
  "this isn’t possible anymore because of property prices"
  - xg15 4mo ago
    Well, ok, but then how are property prices artificially driven up by planning restrictions? Is this just about not allowing more compact housing like condos or high-rises?
    - beerandt 4mo ago
      The key to understanding all of this is that a huge set of Americans 'want' to pay more as an exclusionary benefit. With section 8 (fed housing welfare) rules, any multifamily structure has a better than not chance of becoming slum housing in a time frame less than the average span of homeownership. Which is both about property values and not wanting to live in/near section 8 residents. "Planning" and zoning aren't the problem, they're the enforcement mechanism. (Since police and other public enforcement of quality of life issues has been all but neutered in the name of equity/civil-rights/whatever.) Same reason for the seemingly inexplicable popularity of HOAs that everyone seems to hate. High prices are one of many resultant 'enforcement' prongs.
- watwut 4mo ago
  > Admittedly unpleasant if it means there can't be any grocery store or even café reachable by foot, but at least I get the rationale. I dont get the rationale with those two. What it is, to make living less comforta ble for residents? Doesnt everybody wants a grocery store and cafe nearby?

cousin_it 4mo ago

Well, the planning restrictions don't just come from nowhere. People pay for them (with their lobbying time, lost rent and so on) because they want them. There's a market for "no poors in the neighborhood", an unpleasant market, but a market nonetheless. Add to that the fact that there's plenty of cheap housing in places with no jobs. So, what should we do? Should we fight against the "no poors in the neighborhood" market in rich cities? Or should we make more jobs appear in other cheaper places instead? I don't know the answer, to be honest.

bluGill 4mo ago
> There's a market for "no poors in the neighborhood", an unpleasant market, but a market nonetheless. I place freedom as a higher value than the market. Thus while I recognize that market exists, I don't allow anyone to serve it. Your ability to keep poor people away ends at your property line. They can walk on the sidewalks in front of your house because roads (a sidewalk is just another road) are not your property. They can live in a shack because that isn't your property and so you can't control what they do on it. Freedom isn't absolute. They are not allowed to release poison into the air just because of freedom (unless they can keep that entirely to their property - which ends not far above their buildings since airplanes get their own roads above their house)
- cousin_it 4mo ago
  You're simplifying to the point of nonsense. Freedom you say? How about the freedom to have a say in government of the place you're living in? That seems a pretty fundamental freedom. When the rich folks of a town vote for planning restrictions and the vote goes through, that's an expression of freedom. Sure, we both don't like it. We both agree it has bad consequences. But what I'm trying to say is that there's a real want backed by serious money. One way or another, it will create a market (maybe a shadow market). Rich folks will always want "no poors in the neighborhood" and will keep trying to find ways to spend money to ensure it. They'll never give up. That's why I'm trying to think of solutions that don't require arm-wrestling one market vs another. For example, if we somehow created jobs elsewhere so that poor people wouldn't have to fight rich people for city air, then maybe that could work too.
  - bluGill 4mo ago
    I place strong restrictions on what I allow my governments to control. You get a say in your local government, but that government only has limited things it is allowed to control/do.
    - amanaplanacanal 4mo ago
      Allowing local government to restrict what can be built and where has been a double edged sword. Yes it's good that you can't build noisy, smelly, or potentially polluting activities near where people live. But we have gone far beyond that, in ways that harm our communities, require people to own a car to get through daily life, and leave people sleeping in the street. Some places are taking baby steps in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go.
  - eszed 4mo ago
    > if we somehow created jobs elsewhere so that poor people wouldn't have to fight rich people for city air Or, maybe... a VAT-funded UBI?
    - 4mo ago
rjsw 4mo ago
Pay UBI only at the level needed to live in the place with no jobs and cheap housing.
em-bee 4mo ago
segregating poor people into their own area is a sure way to make them stay poor. i believe there is evidence that the best way to help people out of poverty is to let them live in mixed areas where they have a chance to associate with people who are better off than them. i believe the primary reason is that even if you work hard to improve your life, as long as everyone around you remains poor then you are limited or are self limiting in how much you can actually achieve.
xg15 4mo ago
I mean, one of the main takeaways from the article was that "there is a market for X" is something fundamentally different and sometimes even the opposite of "X is a good thing".

InsideOutSanta 4mo ago

This leads to another problem: markets externalize many costs, which is why regulation exists. Sure, you could let "the economy" build as much as it wants without any regulation, but at what cost?

derektank 4mo ago

Does Sweden have a problem with local land use restrictions? They have done a lot to liberalize their economy over the last few decades

occz 4mo ago
Municipalities have far-reaching power in deciding what gets built where. Getting things built can take quite a long time.

DroneBetter 4mo ago

also just as importantly (or moreso for cases of individual rooms used for social/hobbyist clubs like this) would be 'empty building taxes' to prevent the eventuality of landlords preferring to rent out fewer properties over reducing the cost of vacant ones because * housing is necessary for survival so people cannot afford to baulk at the prices of artificial scarcity, making the optimal price effectively arbitrarily high without regulation * landlords are generally not infinitesimal entities in a vacuum, and generally stand to lose existing customers who are still on the expensive contracts if they cheapen their unoccupied offerings although such a solution would just move the problem one layer further up (stop building properties to have them be vacant) and the solution is land tax

xg15 4mo ago

Not an American, so maybe I'm underestimating the insanity of US zoning laws, but I always thought "residental ares" means "no businesses". Admittedly unpleasant if it means there can't be any grocery store or even café reachable by foot, but at least I get the rationale. But if the zoning restriction is "absolutely nothing except single-family homes", this becomes insane. So even if there is a local neighborhood who would like to build a sports field or a community center, they can't because of zoning? This makes no sense for me at all.

hollerith 4mo ago
"this isn’t possible anymore because of property prices"
- xg15 4mo ago
  Well, ok, but then how are property prices artificially driven up by planning restrictions? Is this just about not allowing more compact housing like condos or high-rises?
  - beerandt 4mo ago
    The key to understanding all of this is that a huge set of Americans 'want' to pay more as an exclusionary benefit. With section 8 (fed housing welfare) rules, any multifamily structure has a better than not chance of becoming slum housing in a time frame less than the average span of homeownership. Which is both about property values and not wanting to live in/near section 8 residents. "Planning" and zoning aren't the problem, they're the enforcement mechanism. (Since police and other public enforcement of quality of life issues has been all but neutered in the name of equity/civil-rights/whatever.) Same reason for the seemingly inexplicable popularity of HOAs that everyone seems to hate. High prices are one of many resultant 'enforcement' prongs.
watwut 4mo ago
> Admittedly unpleasant if it means there can't be any grocery store or even café reachable by foot, but at least I get the rationale. I dont get the rationale with those two. What it is, to make living less comforta ble for residents? Doesnt everybody wants a grocery store and cafe nearby?