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California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

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Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#331

Post by kilotaras »

veeralpatel979 wrote: post #28

To combat many problems, the government would certainly be helpful, but isn't necessary. Take climate change. If every corporation took a carbon negative stance like Stripe and Microsoft, that would make a big dent in carbon emissions. Unfortunately, a lack of housing is a problem that the government created. And it's a problem that only the government, in my view, can really fix. As long as housing supply is artific…

> Take climate change. If every corporation took a carbon negative stance like Stripe and Microsoft, that would make a big dent in carbon emissions.

But then some corporation would move away from that, get extra money and eat competition who is more green/moral/etc.

Competitive economy maximizes profits in the space allowed by regulations. That's a feature, not a bug. But it also means that expecting some sectors/inputs to become unfashionable and die out is very close to wishful thinking.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#332

Post by gzer0 »

kortilla wrote: post #322
gzer0 wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Standard raised prices to its monopolistic customers but lowered them to hurt competitors, often disguising its illegal actions by using bogus supposedly independent companies it controlled [1]. The evidence is, in fact, absolutely conclusive that the Standard Oil Co. charges altogether excessive prices where it meets no competition, and particularly where there is little likelihood of competitors entering the field,…

As if price discrimination isn’t a practice used commonly today.

I'm unsure what point you are trying to make here?

That the practices conducted by Standard Oil were considered acceptable?

Or are you stating that because it is done today (wrongfully so, imo), it was okay back then?

Please elaborate.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#333

Post by manfredo »

Pfhreak wrote: post #222
manfredo wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is increasing the supply of housing going to increase gentrification? The housing shortage has resulted in high housing prices, which is the main driver of gentrification.

Because it will displace communities while the housing is built and there's no guarantee the tenants can move back.

> Because it will displace communities while the housing is built and there's no guarantee the tenants can move back.

Increasing the supply of housing displaces no one. What do you mean "no guarantee that tenants can move back"? A new apartment building creates units that new residents can move into instead of out-bidding residents on the existing supply of housing. An apartment that doesn't get built is an existing resident that now has to compete with more prospective renters, or further subdivisions of the existing housing.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#334

Post by manfredo »

monadic2 wrote: post #245
manfredo wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is increasing the supply of housing going to increase gentrification? The housing shortage has resulted in high housing prices, which is the main driver of gentrification.

Will the people it displaces be able to afford one of the units? If not, it’s just gentrification.

Why would adding more units to the housing supply displace anyone? Who is displaced when 60 new apartment units open open up on a new building? Your question is a vacuously true: everyone who is displaced will be able to afford a new unit, because increasing the supply of housing displaces no one.

In fact, it reduces displacement. Without new housing, more and more people are going to outbidding each other for a constrained supply of housing, thus displacing lower income residents. Increasing the housing supply is the best way to prevent displacement.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#335

Post by Gibbon1 »

rconti wrote: post #293
avocado4 wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Atherton looks so funny from a satellite: https://imgur.com/a/kKpymj9 You can see the NIMBY lines so clearly.

My understanding (via my wife's family, who have been in Menlo Park for ~50 years) is that Atherton doesn't allow lots smaller than 1 acre. I live at the yellow star at the top of the map. Needless to say, my lot is vastly smaller than an acre :)

Friend sent me an old ad for lots in the east bay. The developer was saying they were only selling 50 foot lots. No 25 foot lots! If you look on the map now all the lots have 50 feet of street frontage. If you look at San Francisco they are mostly 25 feet.

The ads date is 1913.

That makes me rethink how much zoning is about muni's forcing developers to do things. And how much of zoning is actually regulatory capture. Developers have always been pushing as much lux as the market and technology can bear. And home owners that are all in try to protect their investment in class distinction.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#336

Post by Gibbon1 »

jibe wrote: post #199
codemac wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are Napa, Atherton, and Malibu filled with environmentalists? I'm so confused by your reaction, are there specific housing policies that are focused on the environment that have had bigger effects than things like prop 13? or cities with 30k jobs in a year but 300 units of housing (looking at you, mountain view)?

The endangered species act probably had 10x the effect on stifling building as Prop 13. Can you imagine a project like Foster City happening in the current environment? https://www.fostercity.org/community/page/creation-foster-ci... It takes Palo Alto 30 years to do flood mitigation because of a couple frogs in the creek. If Mountain View needs housing, make more land. It will never happen because there are always my…

After WWII the Army Core of Engineers had a plan to fill most of the bay.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#337

Post by Gibbon1 »

jayd16 wrote: post #314
Gimpei wrote: post #82

The SF board of supervisors has voted on resolutions opposing this bill several times now. If you care about housing and live in SF, take a second look at your supervisor. Their votes may not make a difference with respect to SB50 but they can certainly block housing in the city and too often they do.

>If you care about housing and live in SF [...] What people don't seem to understand is if you live in SF you probably have housing that's working for you. Lots of people can't live in that city. Guess what? If they don't live there they can't vote there. I'm not sure why but even as people decry NIMBYism they seem to think there's some groundswell of support that's somehow suppressed. At this point we should just ma…

> At this point we should just make Fresno really desirable too or something

That's my rather unpopular opinion. Could just force the Tech Billionaires, VC's and lords of finance to point the fire hose of money somewhere else for a change.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#338

Post by [deleted] »

newguy1234 wrote: post #327
dragonwriter wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This decision is extremely frustrating coming from a legislature filled with landlords. Not only do the people have the power to vote out legislators, in California they also have the power to bypass them and legislate directly. But, while there is broad consensus that housing is a problem, there isn't broad consensus on solutions among the public any more than there is among legislators.

One solution I almost never hear talked about is on the employment side. How about if employers are encouraged to not crowd into dense cities? I've seen some employers offer "remote working" as an option. Quite literally, there is a remote office opened up so the employee doesn't have to either commute into work or they can relocate to a place with affordable housing. I've seen it where a bay area company opened up a…

[deleted]

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#339

Post by CalRobert »

exjdjeejfh wrote: post #76
yonran wrote: post #27

California has a more principled approach to housing capacity planning called RHNA, in which the state sets a zoning budget (like that proposed by David Schleicher https://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/fss_papers/4955/ ) and then delegates to local governments the responsibility to zone to allow enough houses to meet that budget. Unfortunately, the RHNA has numerous flaws including vastly underestimating the “need,” la…

Principled is a way of making it sound less terrible than 'restrained'. California is a perfect example of what happens when you let environmentalists handle housing policy, the poor suffer because environmentalism is classism in disguise in these social contexts.

It's what happens when you let homeowners form a cartel and vote on how much new housing to create (and thus how much to dilute their own home's worth by). Environmentalism has nothing to do with it.

Re: California's housing bill SB 50 has died in the state Senate

#340

Post by CalRobert »

harikb wrote: post #60
throwaway713 wrote: post #33

There’s one thing that constantly confuses me with the housing crisis, which is why more people aren’t moving to other cities (or at least a lot faster than they currently are). Perhaps my mentality is different than most, but if I can improve my economic situation by moving elsewhere I will. I know for some people it is difficult to move because of family ties or costs associated with moving, but I would have though…

California, at least Bay Area in particular, has a slightly different problem that is keeping people stuck here. People can’t live here without both husband and wife working full time. Now to move to a different city or state, both husband and wife needs a job there or the new salary + cost of living must equal the other person quitting their job. That is just a difficult mental model to get over. It will happen, but…

Also, throwing your kid in a new school, giving up your friendships, etc. is not withoud downsides.
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