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The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

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Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#91

Post by door100 »

bigmattystyles wrote: post #86
yellowapple wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, the ownership of property - particularly land - and the use of that property to derive one's income is exactly what differentiates the working class from the ownership class. Landlords are pretty unambiguously in the latter; rent-seeking is not work.

Having known someone who owned and personally maintained a small apartment complex, you are wrong. My FIL is the hardest working person I know.

Property management is work. Owning property is not. For small scale landlords, this is often the same person, and they may do a lot of property management.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#92

Post by sep_field »

All the land in the Bay Area was stolen from indigenous peoples as part of a pogrom of genocide. Many other areas in the United States have a similar issue. Until reparations are paid to the people who were here first, I have zero sympathy for so called "land owners".

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#93

Post by testfoobar »

eecc wrote: post #34
bigmattystyles wrote: post #5

I feel the same way about rent control. It's not fair for society at large to make property owners eat the cost or the lost potential income alone. I am aggressively pro rent control and pro eviction moratorium during the pandemic, but I am for a (progressive) tax to fund these programs. It's just unfair to make yourself feel good by supporting these programs when you don't have any skin in the game. I'm not naïve th…

Another option would be a social housing program to buffer evictions and provide human rights (food and shelter are one, there's absolutely no discussion about this) to those in most difficulty. Of course this approach will be met with howls of criticism about market distortion, having something to do with "social(ism)", and removing incentives to work hard.

Philosophically - there is a solid discussion to be had.

Where does the right to food or shelter originate?

I want to eat and I want shelter. But how and where am I going to get it? Do I have a right to compel someone else to feed and shelter me?

How does my desire for food and shelter turn into a right?

If food and shelter are a right - does it follow that it is now an obligation on someone else to provide me food and shelter? Society is just a group of individuals. Someone is going to have to build a house and someone is going to have to grow potatoes and apples. Do they have an obligation to share the product of their work with me?

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#94

Post by yellowapple »

bigmattystyles wrote: post #86
yellowapple wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, the ownership of property - particularly land - and the use of that property to derive one's income is exactly what differentiates the working class from the ownership class. Landlords are pretty unambiguously in the latter; rent-seeking is not work.

Having known someone who owned and personally maintained a small apartment complex, you are wrong. My FIL is the hardest working person I know.

> My FIL is the hardest working person I know.

A landlord's wealth derives from being a middleman between the tenants and the property, not from the landlord's own labor. That wealth is quite literally the whole point of being a landlord in the first place; if the income from rent didn't significantly exceed the value of the labor your FIL performs as "maintenance", then why would he bother with dealing with all the headaches of property ownership if he could instead just be an employee of the tenants themselves (said tenants forming e.g. a housing cooperative)?

That is: there's nothing a landlord does that the tenants couldn't do themselves (whether directly or by hiring someone to do it on their behalf). It is therefore not labor alone that defines the relationship between a landlord and one's tenants. Your FIL may be "the hardest working person [you] know", but he's still a middleman in the ownership class.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#95

Post by imgabe »

testfoobar wrote: post #93
eecc wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another option would be a social housing program to buffer evictions and provide human rights (food and shelter are one, there's absolutely no discussion about this) to those in most difficulty. Of course this approach will be met with howls of criticism about market distortion, having something to do with "social(ism)", and removing incentives to work hard.

Philosophically - there is a solid discussion to be had. Where does the right to food or shelter originate? I want to eat and I want shelter. But how and where am I going to get it? Do I have a right to compel someone else to feed and shelter me? How does my desire for food and shelter turn into a right? If food and shelter are a right - does it follow that it is now an obligation on someone else to provide me food a…

I find framing things as "rights" is counterproductive. It creates all sorts of entitlement issues. I think it's better to say that society functions better - that is everyone, in total, is generally happier and healthier, if we all agree to work together to provide certain things for each other.

Forget about whether it's a right. Personally, I'd rather live in a society with free, happy people who aren't scared and desperate. I'd prefer it more than being extremely wealthy in a society where large numbers of people are barely able to scrape by. It's just overall a better experience to live in.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#96

Post by refurb »

yellowapple wrote: post #94
bigmattystyles wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having known someone who owned and personally maintained a small apartment complex, you are wrong. My FIL is the hardest working person I know.

> My FIL is the hardest working person I know. A landlord's wealth derives from being a middleman between the tenants and the property, not from the landlord's own labor. That wealth is quite literally the whole point of being a landlord in the first place; if the income from rent didn't significantly exceed the value of the labor your FIL performs as "maintenance", then why would he bother with dealing with all the…

Sure the landlord is doing something I can’t, as a tenant, can’t do myself - if all I have is an income of a few thousand a month and I need housing, the landlord is providing me housing I couldn’t otherwise afford.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#97

Post by door100 »

refurb wrote: post #96
yellowapple wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My FIL is the hardest working person I know. A landlord's wealth derives from being a middleman between the tenants and the property, not from the landlord's own labor. That wealth is quite literally the whole point of being a landlord in the first place; if the income from rent didn't significantly exceed the value of the labor your FIL performs as "maintenance", then why would he bother with dealing with all the…

Sure the landlord is doing something I can’t, as a tenant, can’t do myself - if all I have is an income of a few thousand a month and I need housing, the landlord is providing me housing I couldn’t otherwise afford.

What kind of housing someone can afford is a political question. Our current answer to it is that this should be resolved through market mechanisms, which creates high prices alongside scarcity

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#98

Post by yellowapple »

refurb wrote: post #90
yellowapple wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, the ownership of property - particularly land - and the use of that property to derive one's income is exactly what differentiates the working class from the ownership class. Landlords are pretty unambiguously in the latter; rent-seeking is not work.

This seems like a great theoretical internet take and not applicable to the real world in the least. So some 50 year old blue collar dude who saves just enough to buy a duplex and live in half of it, but can’t stop working or he’ll starve, has suddenly been propelled from the working class into the lazy, cigar-smoking, top hat twirling capital class?

Yes.

If he wants to not be in that "lazy, cigar-smoking, top hat twirling capital class" (as you put it - because apparently hyperbole and gross misrepresentation of an argument counts as "discussion" on Hacker News nowadays), he is welcome to transition his ownership of that duplex into, say, a housing cooperative consisting of himself and the other half of that duplex (or - more likely - a cooperative for the land and the duplex's exterior, and retain ownership of his own unit while putting the other unit up for sale - effectively forming a COA, but cooperatively owned).

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#99

Post by yellowapple »

door100 wrote: post #97
refurb wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure the landlord is doing something I can’t, as a tenant, can’t do myself - if all I have is an income of a few thousand a month and I need housing, the landlord is providing me housing I couldn’t otherwise afford.

What kind of housing someone can afford is a political question. Our current answer to it is that this should be resolved through market mechanisms, which creates high prices alongside scarcity

Ain't even the market mechanisms themselves that drive the high prices; rather, it's what those market mechanisms track.

Transitioning from land prices to land rental values - i.e. gradually moving toward a 100% land value tax - would address both high prices and scarcity by taxing land consumption - and, accordingly, encouraging urban density in order to amortize that tax, thus alleviating scarcity and reducing residential expenses. Same market at play (a land value tax definitionally taxes the market value of land); vastly improved outcome.

Re: The Victims of the Eviction Moratorium

#100

Post by testfoobar »

imgabe wrote: post #95
testfoobar wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Philosophically - there is a solid discussion to be had. Where does the right to food or shelter originate? I want to eat and I want shelter. But how and where am I going to get it? Do I have a right to compel someone else to feed and shelter me? How does my desire for food and shelter turn into a right? If food and shelter are a right - does it follow that it is now an obligation on someone else to provide me food a…

I find framing things as "rights" is counterproductive. It creates all sorts of entitlement issues. I think it's better to say that society functions better - that is everyone, in total, is generally happier and healthier, if we all agree to work together to provide certain things for each other. Forget about whether it's a right. Personally, I'd rather live in a society with free, happy people who aren't scared and…

Agreed. Raising the floor for everyone by supporting each other is a great objective. It would be beneficial for all of us to greatly reduce food, shelter, income and healthcare insecurity.

But this isn't the way our current political discourse is going. Instead new rights are being created seemingly by the day. Voters are asked by politicians to demand their rights. If housing is a right, then some politician will eventually say that vacation homes are also a right. If employment is a right, then employment at the workplace of your choosing is a right.

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