4 ms·

It costs a lot to move, especially when you are unskilled and have no idea if you will be able to find employment wherever you end up. It is made worse when you

It costs a lot to move, especially when you are unskilled and have no idea if you will be able to find employment wherever you end up. It is made worse when you are participating in any sort of social safety net because you don't know if you'll have that available when you get wherever the grass is greener. And that says nothing about social and familial networks.

benten10 12y ago
Thank you! I can see how one might feel 'just move' is a good argument, but really NO! In chinatowns all over the country, whenever low-income residents are being priced out, the argument is always 'you can just find another place to stay'. They've lived there for decades, if not more. That's where all the people they know are. They are poor but they do have a support system, that lives with them. When they move away, not only are they economically helpless, but also socially helpless. To tell people to just 'move away' is very dense, IMHO. You might not feel the same way about places you live in, but some people feel VERY STRONGLY emotionally about where they live. Consider the fact that when there's natural disasters/flood/earthquake/radiation leaks, there's not insignificant percentage of people who would rather stay where they are and suffer the consequences rather than move away. Which is why evacuations often have to be FORCED! People would rather die than move away from their homes. You cannot just say 'they can just move away': the concerns are valid.
- Domenic_S 12y ago
  > some people feel VERY STRONGLY emotionally about where they live Those feelings are a luxury. Taxpayers should not be forced to bear the cost of someone's emotional attachments. I would prefer tax dollars be spent on relocation assistance + job placement to help get people on a sustainable path.
  - benten10 12y ago
    I can also understand that. Now these people, not making a lot of money. They at least had a social support system, happy with friends families etc. They had a place they could call their own, and the pride that comes with it. You've taken their support system out. In short, it is cheaper to build them houses and put them there, than to put them in prisons. Whether people get happy in places they like, or they get pissed at the system and live in prison, it's your tax dollars either way.
    - bequanna 12y ago
      > In short, it is cheaper to build them houses and put them there, than to put them in prisons. Whether people get happy in places they like, or they get pissed at the system and live in prison, it's your tax dollars either way. This solution makes me really uncomfortable. You're completely disregarding the individual and saying that we are responsible for creating an environment for them and ultimately, we are responsible for their behavior. These are independent, adult people who are perfectly capable of making their own decisions, good or bad, and living with the consequences of those decisions. It shouldn't be the public's responsibility to remove them from neighborhoods or 'build them houses and put them there' as you said. If low income people want to live in one of the most expensive areas in the world, they can. But they shouldn't expect to live well.
      - logical42 12y ago
        You know, it's quite possible to treat adults as independent agents who are responsible for their own actions and yet acknowledge (and possibly even be sympathetic to) the fact that these same adults can be subject to external forces which put them in a really tough spot.
        Domenic_S 12y ago
        Of course. But what about the people who are in a tough spot because of internal forces? Surely you don't think the woman in the first video fell pregnant a second time because of external forces? Yes, some people do have the story of "got laid off after 35 years, company stole my pension, now I'm homeless", or "had a long, expensive medical emergency, now am homeless". You can pinpoint the external force. But this piece showed one thing in particular that was striking: it seems it's rarely one major event that plunges someone into a bad situation like these (consider that none of these videos had one "this is what happened" sound bite). It seems like it's the snowball effect of bad decision after bad decision. What do we do with people who are in really tough spots because of the compounding behavior of bad decisions? "We invest in the educational system so kids learn how to avoid these spots" -- ok, great, but what do we do with THESE people, today? Accepting the "external forces" thing is a slippery slope, because now somebody is the arbiter of You Did It To Yourself vs. It's Not Your Fault. Who can we trust with that position? Is it even moral to make that judgement? Was this whole comment satire on being the arbiter of justice?
  - lotsofmangos 12y ago
    Grapes of Wrath, iPhone edition. edit - it seems strange that many well paid technocrats will happily hold sway on the possibilities of sea-steading, or building fusion reactors, or anything involving a giant laser, or suchlike, but throw up their hands and declare the problem of houses for the poor people they or their workforce are displacing to be an insurmountable fact of the economy that can only be solved by the poor people moving to somewhere that hasn't yet become cool. And to be utterly cynical about the whole thing, if rich folk really want to build a city on a hill, they probably shouldn't price out all the trades if they want it to function in the long run.
  - Frondo 12y ago
    Why not? If enough of us decide that emotions are worth supporting, why shouldn't taxpayers make that a priority?
    - Lawtonfogle 12y ago
      If you convince enough to change the laws, then the nature of our system is that they will be convinced. The question is, can you convince enough. Perhaps I see many luxuries as not worth supporting, at least not until other problems are solved (and being government revenue is limited, sometimes being low priority means not being funded at all).
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    I think you mean 'people ho pay more tax'. People living in poor neighborhoods typically pay taxes as well - on some of their income, most of their consumption, and on their residences since their rent is inclusive of property tax. I do not understand this insistence that money spent on building more housing here is bad whereas spending the same amount of money on having 'those people' move out of sight to somewhere else is somehow good.
    - CountSessine 12y ago
      I do not understand this insistence that money spent on building more housing here is bad whereas spending the same amount of money on having 'those people' move out of sight to somewhere else is somehow good. Where does this housing get built? Why would you build it on some of the most expensive land (SV) in the lower 48? I think the gap in your understanding is because you're just not listening to everyone telling you that the government's limited money will go further if it doesn't have to render/compensate landowners in the most expensive real estate market in the country. It's ludicrous to suggest that the government spend money buying land to build co-op housing in SV.
      - anigbrowl 12y ago
        The problem in SV and much of SF is the unwillingess of property owners to tolerate too much upward building and their use of the private right of action granted by the California Environmental Quality Act to stymie development at the planning permission stage. Incumbent landowners try to maintain the value of their investment by limiting any increases in density. We might, for example, do better to abandon zoning and instead set up mechanisms to auction development rights, eg http://marketurbanism.com/2012/01/06/the-coase-theorem-in-land-use/ http://marketurbanism.com/2012/01/06/the-coase-theorem-in-la...
  - chaqke 12y ago
    Living in an area can be more than an emotional decision - for example, nearby family members might provide free childcare. Moving elsewhere would cause childcare to be a (large) financial burden. A family on the edge doesn't always have the luxury to move.
slipjack 12y ago
Not to mention that a family's informal support network often works as a subsidy/social safety net, and when you move that definitely will not follow you. Probably the most common example is that many families in the US use family members to care for small children, because child care can easily cost ~30% of a family's income. Asking families to move to a lower COL area may well mean they have to pay more.

benten10 12y ago

Thank you! I can see how one might feel 'just move' is a good argument, but really NO! In chinatowns all over the country, whenever low-income residents are being priced out, the argument is always 'you can just find another place to stay'. They've lived there for decades, if not more. That's where all the people they know are. They are poor but they do have a support system, that lives with them. When they move away, not only are they economically helpless, but also socially helpless. To tell people to just 'move away' is very dense, IMHO. You might not feel the same way about places you live in, but some people feel VERY STRONGLY emotionally about where they live. Consider the fact that when there's natural disasters/flood/earthquake/radiation leaks, there's not insignificant percentage of people who would rather stay where they are and suffer the consequences rather than move away. Which is why evacuations often have to be FORCED! People would rather die than move away from their homes. You cannot just say 'they can just move away': the concerns are valid.

Domenic_S 12y ago
> some people feel VERY STRONGLY emotionally about where they live Those feelings are a luxury. Taxpayers should not be forced to bear the cost of someone's emotional attachments. I would prefer tax dollars be spent on relocation assistance + job placement to help get people on a sustainable path.
- benten10 12y ago
  I can also understand that. Now these people, not making a lot of money. They at least had a social support system, happy with friends families etc. They had a place they could call their own, and the pride that comes with it. You've taken their support system out. In short, it is cheaper to build them houses and put them there, than to put them in prisons. Whether people get happy in places they like, or they get pissed at the system and live in prison, it's your tax dollars either way.
  - bequanna 12y ago
    > In short, it is cheaper to build them houses and put them there, than to put them in prisons. Whether people get happy in places they like, or they get pissed at the system and live in prison, it's your tax dollars either way. This solution makes me really uncomfortable. You're completely disregarding the individual and saying that we are responsible for creating an environment for them and ultimately, we are responsible for their behavior. These are independent, adult people who are perfectly capable of making their own decisions, good or bad, and living with the consequences of those decisions. It shouldn't be the public's responsibility to remove them from neighborhoods or 'build them houses and put them there' as you said. If low income people want to live in one of the most expensive areas in the world, they can. But they shouldn't expect to live well.
    - logical42 12y ago
      You know, it's quite possible to treat adults as independent agents who are responsible for their own actions and yet acknowledge (and possibly even be sympathetic to) the fact that these same adults can be subject to external forces which put them in a really tough spot.
      - Domenic_S 12y ago
        Of course. But what about the people who are in a tough spot because of internal forces? Surely you don't think the woman in the first video fell pregnant a second time because of external forces? Yes, some people do have the story of "got laid off after 35 years, company stole my pension, now I'm homeless", or "had a long, expensive medical emergency, now am homeless". You can pinpoint the external force. But this piece showed one thing in particular that was striking: it seems it's rarely one major event that plunges someone into a bad situation like these (consider that none of these videos had one "this is what happened" sound bite). It seems like it's the snowball effect of bad decision after bad decision. What do we do with people who are in really tough spots because of the compounding behavior of bad decisions? "We invest in the educational system so kids learn how to avoid these spots" -- ok, great, but what do we do with THESE people, today? Accepting the "external forces" thing is a slippery slope, because now somebody is the arbiter of You Did It To Yourself vs. It's Not Your Fault. Who can we trust with that position? Is it even moral to make that judgement? Was this whole comment satire on being the arbiter of justice?
- lotsofmangos 12y ago
  Grapes of Wrath, iPhone edition. edit - it seems strange that many well paid technocrats will happily hold sway on the possibilities of sea-steading, or building fusion reactors, or anything involving a giant laser, or suchlike, but throw up their hands and declare the problem of houses for the poor people they or their workforce are displacing to be an insurmountable fact of the economy that can only be solved by the poor people moving to somewhere that hasn't yet become cool. And to be utterly cynical about the whole thing, if rich folk really want to build a city on a hill, they probably shouldn't price out all the trades if they want it to function in the long run.
- Frondo 12y ago
  Why not? If enough of us decide that emotions are worth supporting, why shouldn't taxpayers make that a priority?
  - Lawtonfogle 12y ago
    If you convince enough to change the laws, then the nature of our system is that they will be convinced. The question is, can you convince enough. Perhaps I see many luxuries as not worth supporting, at least not until other problems are solved (and being government revenue is limited, sometimes being low priority means not being funded at all).
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  I think you mean 'people ho pay more tax'. People living in poor neighborhoods typically pay taxes as well - on some of their income, most of their consumption, and on their residences since their rent is inclusive of property tax. I do not understand this insistence that money spent on building more housing here is bad whereas spending the same amount of money on having 'those people' move out of sight to somewhere else is somehow good.
  - CountSessine 12y ago
    I do not understand this insistence that money spent on building more housing here is bad whereas spending the same amount of money on having 'those people' move out of sight to somewhere else is somehow good. Where does this housing get built? Why would you build it on some of the most expensive land (SV) in the lower 48? I think the gap in your understanding is because you're just not listening to everyone telling you that the government's limited money will go further if it doesn't have to render/compensate landowners in the most expensive real estate market in the country. It's ludicrous to suggest that the government spend money buying land to build co-op housing in SV.
    - anigbrowl 12y ago
      The problem in SV and much of SF is the unwillingess of property owners to tolerate too much upward building and their use of the private right of action granted by the California Environmental Quality Act to stymie development at the planning permission stage. Incumbent landowners try to maintain the value of their investment by limiting any increases in density. We might, for example, do better to abandon zoning and instead set up mechanisms to auction development rights, eg http://marketurbanism.com/2012/01/06/the-coase-theorem-in-land-use/ http://marketurbanism.com/2012/01/06/the-coase-theorem-in-la...
- chaqke 12y ago
  Living in an area can be more than an emotional decision - for example, nearby family members might provide free childcare. Moving elsewhere would cause childcare to be a (large) financial burden. A family on the edge doesn't always have the luxury to move.

slipjack 12y ago

Not to mention that a family's informal support network often works as a subsidy/social safety net, and when you move that definitely will not follow you. Probably the most common example is that many families in the US use family members to care for small children, because child care can easily cost ~30% of a family's income. Asking families to move to a lower COL area may well mean they have to pay more.