Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes they are horrible and yes they are exploiting people. It's not a service, they are exploiting the capped supply of a basic need. The argument about "if nobody rents out" is just wrong. Are they going to knock the place down if they don't rent? Yes there is a need for rentals but this should be within a world where we have land value tax so the bulk of the gain is passed onto the state to reduce labour taxes, redu…
And suppose that someone follows the teachings of Rich Dad, Poor Dad but doesn't buy land or property, instead investing in something else that generates revenue, otherwise following the book's advice to the letter. Do you still object? On what grounds? I can see you think that land tax would be fairer (I'm inclined to agree) but that's really not related to the message of the book. Are you opposed to private ownersh…
Were this to stop I think that we'd see a lot more actual productive work and a fall in the need for people to work all the time. The existing system ensures we all work all the time. If we get more productive rents go up to capture the gain.
If this stopped we'd see more people able to opt out of the labour market and we'd see a shift towards employees dictating terms, who would demand a higher cut of their value added via higher wages. They'd also get to keep more as most income tax would be replaced by land value tax.
If you invest in wealth generation that's fine to take a share of this. I'd like to see the high end taxed so being born isn't like joining a game of Monopoly near the end but in general this works for me.
What I'd really like to see is people who create wealth getting to keep that. What I see now is a bunch of b@stards exploiting our flawed / corrupt debt based system to capture wealth creation.
Land is a special case. You can make more laptops so if want to corner the market in that go right ahead, waste your money. Land is finite and it's the source of all wealth. Why should someone own this in perpetuity and be free to extract a percent of labour from someone else, handing it down across generations like kings?
We should each contribute and if we contribute well we live well. An end to the rentier leeches.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltz3e9LDaJ0
First 10 seconds "the game Monopoly" used as praise. Originally called "the landlord's game" inspired by the writings of Henry George as a criticism of land enclosure and money. He retires early because he has a stream of income from the labour of others. Nice!
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/apr/11/secret-h...