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Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
31–40 of 497 posts
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#32I agreee that speculation on property solely as an asset is an issue, but don't really agree with the premise early in the article around the growth of cities. The argument strikes me as something like this: * An increase in the size of urban areas would increase GDP by 4% * Anything which blocks this growth is bad * Home ownership blocks this increase * Therefore, home ownership is bad The implicit premise is that a…
> I agreee that speculation on property solely as an asset is an issue Speculation helps create a liquid market and stabilize prices.
In practice, speculation maximises value extracted by speculators. But yes, "maximum bearable" price is stable.
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#33> At the root of that failure is a lack of building, especially near the thriving cities in which jobs are plentiful. I think the biggest economic policy failure of the West is the hyper-concentration of high-paying jobs and enormous wealth in a few cities. What percentage of wealth do New York, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and London represent? The truth is as long as the wealth is hyperconcentrated in these…
>In this age of jet aircraft, high speed rail, and high speed internet, it is a shame that we still cannot spread out the economic opportunities over larger areas.
Actually, this only makes thing worse, because your boss gets to decide where you live. After all, you can easily reach all your customers from a single location thanks to these technologies.
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#34> a generation of young people who cannot easily afford to rent or buy and think capitalism has let them down
Thats not some irrational misconception- capitalism has indeed let these people down.
Capitalism, a set of social policies that prioritises the needs of capital over the needs of people, is literally a system that is designed to concentrate ownership. Under capitalism the best way to make money is to own, or have access to, capital: therefore if you want a house, the best way to do that is to already have another house.
I'm not going to pretend to have the answers to this problem (although they probably involve some combination of tax relief for owner-occupancy, and a relaxation of planning regulations), but it is important to recognise the housing crisis as a negative outcome of capitalism, just as technology should be recognised as a positive outcome.
The more people have access to capital, the more popular and sensible capitalism becomes. Home ownership is the best way to promote capitalism, and government should do its best to encourage it.
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#35Owner occupation of property vs rent seeking ownership are 2 very different paradigms. The former results in community, and investment and a large number of beneficial economic effects. The later is simply an economic parasite Only have to look to the past to see what happened with farming. Substance farming and feudaliam was inefficient and disincentified investment.(why improve land you don't own and someone else r…
Subsistence farming? That just means that most of what you farm is used to feed yourself and your family.
It's not really that subsistence farming is inefficient, it's just that subsistence farmers (by definition) are not selling food on the market.
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#36> a generation of young people who cannot easily afford to rent or buy and think capitalism has let them down Thats not some irrational misconception- capitalism has indeed let these people down. Capitalism, a set of social policies that prioritises the needs of capital over the needs of people, is literally a system that is designed to concentrate ownership. Under capitalism the best way to make money is to own, or…
You could regulate the market. 1 house per person perhaps? I can only sleep in one bed at a time. It makes sense to have only one.
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#37What if renters could have a way to pay more to gain partial ownership of their property? E.g., could progressively own up to 10%. That woulf allow for more of the feeling of ownership and allow renters to participate in the appreciation. That would mitigate some of the negative impacts of gentrification.
Has anyone given this sort of renter-ownership blend a thought?
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#38Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#39What's this obsession with increasing housing density? Population in the developing world is leveling off. Most of the developed world is already at "peak child".[1] Housing shortages come from migration to cities, not more people. [1] https://ourworldindata.org/peak-child
The environment, for one thing. Cities emit much less CO2 on a per capita basis. E.O. Wilson put out a bold plan turn half of Earths landmass into a wildlife preserve[1] and something of that scale can only be accomplished by building very, very large cities.
The other reason is economics, cities inherently generate greater GDP per capita, especially in highly creative fields. In parts of the world where real estate isn't subject to "hot money", they're also engines for economic advancement and social mobility. (And to an extent, they're somewhat that way in the US, UK, and other locations as well, but their impact is heavily diluted by lack of housing affordability.)
[1] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200318-the-worlds-large...
Re: Home ownership is the West’s biggest economic-policy mistake
#40What if renters could have a way to pay more to gain partial ownership of their property? E.g., could progressively own up to 10%. That woulf allow for more of the feeling of ownership and allow renters to participate in the appreciation. That would mitigate some of the negative impacts of gentrification. Has anyone given this sort of renter-ownership blend a thought?
That sounds complicated, and I can't imagine landlords voting that policy in.
If renters want to invest why can't they take that bit extra and invest it elsewhere?