Ruzihm posted:

lol as if the very instant a bill was floated that would expropriate the rental properties of the top 1% you wouldn't rally around them in bourgeois solidarity.

poopinmymouth posted:

The top 1% rely on the next 9% to uphold the system and gaslight the bottom 90% that all is fine.

https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/559130/

poopinmymouth posted:

I mean, I would because I think housing is a human right and as long as it was ubiquitous I'm game. But I realize the majority of landlords behave exactly like you say.

Thermopyle posted:

Additionally, I don't think it follows that policies that reduce homelessness AND the amount of vacant homes requires financial sacrifice on the part of landlords.

Thermopyle posted:

I might be wrong, but my feeling is that for most people owning a couple of rental properties even puts then in the top 10% by net worth or income.

It certainly doesn't even come close in my area.

Karl Barks posted:

I guess I don't see how this makes any sense in a market system. either housing stock is expropriated, profits are taxed to fund programs, more housing stock is built to drop rents which reduces profits, etc. all of these things impact landlords negatively. unless this is like a fox business "we'll just grow ourselves out of the problem!" type argument, I don't know

baquerd posted:

This is one of those cases where the free market just needs to be more free to make room for lower income housing.

Karl Barks posted:

this is like a fox business "we'll just grow ourselves out of the problem!" type argument

baquerd posted:

Somewhat pertinent video on the cost of rent versus wages:



This is one of those cases where the free market just needs to be more free to make room for lower income housing.

poopinmymouth posted:

So we currently have more houses than homeless now, why would *even more* houses somehow reverse the trend of only allocating housing by income again? Is this like libertarianism where it only starts to work when you get it exactly perfect and 100% but up until then the opposite effect occurs? Isn't there a word for that... wishful thinking? denial? No true scotsman?

ThatBasqueGuy posted:

I too think we should fix this issue caused by developers and speculators by giving them a free hand to continue their depravations completely unabated.

All in the hopes that it alleviates a marginal % of the issue. My god have some self-respect.

baquerd posted:

The homeless aren't typically the ones I'm trying to attract in this situation. A lot of places that could benefit the most from denser housing have tons of people commuting multiple hours because they've been priced out of the market in areas with shorter commutes. I bring these people back in by building denser housing, which is relatively cheaper for me to maintain and for them to rent. As a side effect, some people who might be near-homeless can now afford housing as a result of the overall increase in housing affordability.

Crazycryodude posted:

Question: have we considered chopping off the heads of the class enemies and taking all their poo poo?

Ruzihm posted:

fyi u were replying to a post asking how you can reduce the number of homeless people without inconvencing landlords.

poopinmymouth posted:

wasn't it still an illuminating answer how he just discarded homeless as inconsequential?

https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22533&LangID=E

baquerd posted:

It's been real educational seeing how policies of treating the homeless really well in SF and LA have worked out.

https://reason.com/reasontv/2019/02/05/stossel-bad-laws-cause-homeless-crisis

There's obviously a huge problem there, but I don't see how giving them housing is going to solve any of it. Giving them proper housing is like end game level poo poo compared to the hurdles they need to jump over to get integrated into society in general.

baquerd posted:

No one's saying slaveowners were better than that, just that slaveowners that didn't take care of their slaves got sub-par returns over the long run. If you look at the most successful slave-owners, you would expect to see a general pattern of excellent treatment of well-behaved slaves.

Kobayashi posted:

baquerd posted:

It's been real educational seeing how policies of treating the homeless really well in SF and LA have worked out.

https://reason.com/reasontv/2019/02/05/stossel-bad-laws-cause-homeless-crisis

There's obviously a huge problem there, but I don't see how giving them housing is going to solve any of it. Giving them proper housing is like end game level poo poo compared to the hurdles they need to jump over to get integrated into society in general.

quote:

Laura Foote runs the non-profit "YIMBY Action," which stands for "yes in my backyard." The organization promotes policies that encourage more housing construction as a way to bring down prices.

Many San Francisco residents object to this mission.

"I would hate it," one woman told John Stossel.

"I think it'd be really congested," said another.

"Let me build," said developer John Dennis. He spent years trying to get permission to replace a graffiti-covered, long-defunct meat-packing plant with a 60-unit building. He eventually got permission—but it took 4 years.

Karl Barks posted:

I guess I don't see how this makes any sense in a market system. either housing stock is expropriated, profits are taxed to fund programs, more housing stock is built to drop rents which reduces profits, etc. all of these things impact landlords negatively. unless this is like a fox business "we'll just grow ourselves out of the problem!" type argument, I don't know

poopinmymouth posted:

Try this: http://www.globalrichlist.com/ Do it by wealth not income. You might be surprised how high up you score if you hold real estate assets and aren't up to your eyeballs in debt.

Kobayashi posted:

The way you implicitly demonize homeless people here is telling.

Thermopyle posted:

I really wish you would explain this because it bothers me that you think I demonize homeless people.

Thermopyle posted:

I really wish you would explain this because it bothers me that you think I demonize homeless people.

Kobayashi posted:

You quoted a slavery apologist talking about "the homeless," added this bolding, "My argument is that putting some random homeless people in a free 3bed/2bath in a nice neighborhood is probably going to end with the home value turned to poo poo," and raised it by saying "not just the home itself, but likely the surrounding homes." I think it is callous to place "value" above abject human suffering and infantilizing to imply homeless people "don't have any experience dealing with the maintenance, care, and handling of the responsibility being given to them."

Crazycryodude posted:

Letting the icky poors into the neighborhood will destroy our precious LAND VALUE, and it's better for the icky poors to freeze on the streets rather than REDUCE SHAREHOLDER VALUE

Wiggly Wayne DDS posted:

the answer is to hand those abandoned homes over to your local council/housing association (note: not homeowners association) and give them appropriate financing to bring up to standards fit for people to live in

Wiggly Wayne DDS posted:

sounds abandoned to me, i've seen no evidence of occupancy. if we don't get a reply and proof of tenancy in the next 60 days we're changing the locks

Thermopyle posted:

That might be. But I think there's a difference between abandoned homes and homes that MegaCorp is purposely keeping empty and I don't know how the percentage of those categories break down.

Thermopyle posted:

This is a bad conversation because there are multiple lines of disagreement. Two of the most surface-level discussions are about the situation wherein there are people without homes and there are lots of homes local to them that are empty, and the situation where are there are no homes/rental units available and thus the prices are high.

The solutions and moral positions for each of these situations are not the same.


First off, as I think about it, my comments were in the context where I take the term "great financial sacrifice" in a manner other than what you possibly intend.


Where I talk about the problem of excess housing and homelessness:

I'll point out that increasing housing stock is not the solution in the case where we're talking about lots of empty homes sitting around,

Putting aside any policy/systematic changes and host of issues that cause homelessness...just straight up brute-forcing the problem by paying rent for the homeless isn't that large a problem in monetary terms compared to a lot of other things and I don't see any reason to see that landlords over all of the other 10 percenters or whatever would or should bear the sole brunt of the cost for that.

On another tangent, while it wouldn't be my favored solution, giving empty homes to homeless people by taking them away from their current owners wouldn't be the end of the world if done correctly. After all, there's 20-40 times vacant homes in the US as there are homeless people. Of course, that would involve relocating homeless people to where the houses are.

Where I talk about the problem of limited housing and high rents:

Many developers advocate explicitly for policies increasing housing stock in areas like CA. The thing is, is that even if limited stock increases profits per unit for existing developers, other developers want a slice of the pie in other markets that they can't get because they can't create new housing.

I can't find any studies quantifying sources of opposition to laxer zoning laws, but most of the articles I come across seem to stem from NIMBYism and not landlords wanting to protect their high rents. But I can't make any concrete claims one way or the other than to say that given what I currently know NIMBYism is the largest obstacle to increased housing supply and lower rents.

There's also the dynamic where increasing the number of available housing units lowers the per unit profit but increases overall profit by virtue of higher number of units owned.

Note, that I'm not claiming that we need more fat cat property owners, only that increasing housing supply and lowering rents is not in direct competition with profit motives.


Anyway, I'm not worried about the revolution because I live in a market where I can own rental property, charge reasonable rents, care about my tenants, help the poor, do all my own maintenance, etc. Unless of course the revolutionaries just paint with a broad brush and throw everyone who charges someone else rent up against the wall. Revolutionaries never do that, do they?

Karl Barks posted:

Also, what if we had one big land lord which by virtue of it's size would bring the profit per unit to an absolute minimum and increase overall profit while providing a house for every person? is this a crazy idea?

Karl Barks posted:

I'm not a revolutionary, so I wouldn't know. My understanding is some countries were better than others.

Also, what if we had one big land lord which by virtue of it's size would bring the profit per unit to an absolute minimum and increase overall profit while providing a house for every person? is this a crazy idea?

baquerd posted:

I think you're confusing the economies of scale that come with building denser housing and the competitive forces that actually reduce rents. You can go full socialism and try to give everyone affordable rent, but then you start down the road of having to pay for that poo poo when there is no incentive for anyone to work harder just to pay more and extensive corruption where those who "know" the "land lord" in this case get extremely preferential treatment. That way lies actual socialism and societal collapse, as compared to capitalist countries that have strong social safety nets. That way is why monopolies are illegal.

baquerd posted:

I think you're confusing the economies of scale that come with building denser housing and the competitive forces that actually reduce rents. You can go full socialism and try to give everyone affordable rent, but then you start down the road of having to pay for that poo poo when there is no incentive for anyone to work harder just to pay more and extensive corruption where those who "know" the "land lord" in this case get extremely preferential treatment. That way lies actual socialism and societal collapse, as compared to capitalist countries that have strong social safety nets. That way is why monopolies are illegal.

Wiggly Wayne DDS posted:

perhaps make it a regulated industry with an ombudsman for complaints and have transparency down to average rent/unit size all viewable online

oh and yearly regulatory returns with auditors everywhere

Karl Barks posted:

Yet there are monopolies, whether they're regional or national, everywhere. I did get a good laugh out of "That way lies actual socialism ... strong social safety nets", I can see who I'm talking to now.