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I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

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Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#211

Post by LurkingPenguin »

bsder wrote: post #130
LurkingPenguin wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hope springs eternal in California, but unfortunately water does not.

Consumer water needs are just fine. The coastal areas where most people live are building desalinization plants and will keep doing so until consumer water needs are met. When you talk about California water crisis, you are talking about California Agribusiness water crisis. Yes, the farms in the Central Valley will eventually eat themselves like Easter Island once they drain the aquifer completely.

Desalination is not a magic panacea. It requires significant amounts of energy and has significant environmental impacts.

As for the Central Valley, when the farms "eat themselves", have you considered that growing numbers of Americans will have to do the same? The Central Valley produces a quarter of the nation's food even though it represents 1% of the nation's farmland.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#212

Post by imtringued »

zebnyc wrote: post #167
CheezeIt wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike other states, California property tax rates don’t increase with market value.

Can you clarify this? Property taxes are what are holding me back from making a bid for a more expensive home. If I buy a home for $1 million, won't I have to pay property taxes based on that price even if it was previously tax assessed at $100k.

You already answered your own question.

If property taxes were higher you wouldn't have to pay $1 million for the home because nobody can afford those property taxes and subsequently nobody would actually bid $1 million.

Meanwhile if you make property taxes negative then you could afford the same house for $2 million.

Edit: How can property taxes be negative? The government can use income taxes to build infrastructure to raise the value of your land.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#213

Post by pydry »

j8hn wrote: post #139

I don't have any experience with the housing issue in California, but got involved a while back trying to find pragmatic solutions in Seattle. The situation is a mess and there is an entire "homeless industrial complex" complicating matters here, rife with fraud, misspending and cronyism. Every year it seems like many millions of dollars more are spent on this issue but it keeps getting visibly worse. At first I was…

>Every year it seems like many millions of dollars more are spent on this issue but it keeps getting visibly worse.

Because home prices and rents keep going up. Homelessness is an inevitable side effect of that.

Funneling money on rehab rather than providing places to actually live cant fix that. It's attacking a symptom not the cause.

However, attacking the cause (property prices/rents) would make a lot of very rich, very powerful people very angry - all backed by an army of overleveraged homeowners terrified of negative equity.

Until property owners are apoplectic with fury about declining property values I doubt the problem will stop getting worse.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#214

Post by imtringued »

colinmhayes wrote: post #150
lbarrow wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

55% is one of the lowest home ownership rates in the country. If high levels of home ownership drive policies that prohibit new construction and drive up prices, how is it that places like Minnesota, with a home ownership rate in the mid-70s, are so cheap to live in?

Prop 13 takes away the normal downside to rising home prices.

If there is empirical evidence in favor of land value taxes then it would be the entirety of California.

Come on, taxes on land are glorious. Hongkong charges 17% income taxes on the rich and https://youtu.be/XL3n59wC8kk?t=1917

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#215

Post by imtringued »

fortran77 wrote: post #136
Talanes wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's worth noting that property taxes in California are only re-assessed on ownership change or new construction. There's no downside to having the value of your home balloon as much as possible.

Sure there is. Your property tax still goes up 2% a year if home prices rise. That's more than inflation has been. Rising prices also traps people -- they can't afford to move anywhere unless they go far away. As a CA homeowner (nortgage paid up!) I'd be much happier if house prices were half off what they are.

Then argue in favor of land value taxes instead of regressive taxes on work.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#216

Post by imtringued »

jjav wrote: post #199
Schnitz wrote: post #26

> Rather than asking "Who can we blame?" maybe we could start asking "How do we fix it?" Nobody talks about the hard truth: The homeownership rate in California is ~55% and therefore over half of Californians are heavily incentivized to keep the housing crisis going. For existing homeowners this isn't a crisis, it's a free paper money bonanza. Just by living in their houses home "owners" (most are heavily leveraged)…

> therefore over half of Californians are heavily incentivized to keep the housing crisis going This is a too-frequent HN meme but it doesn't really work that way. There is no special club of homeowners that have more say in what politicians do. Just one vote per person, same as non-homeowners. And turns out homeowners don't spend time thinking about this, let alone scheming to somehow "keep the housing crisis going"…

That doesn't change that they are the source of the problem and that they get paid to cause the problem and be against its solutions. They also throw money into the throats of large corporations that own a huge amount of land.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#217

Post by imtringued »

MomoXenosaga wrote: post #205
jjav wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> therefore over half of Californians are heavily incentivized to keep the housing crisis going This is a too-frequent HN meme but it doesn't really work that way. There is no special club of homeowners that have more say in what politicians do. Just one vote per person, same as non-homeowners. And turns out homeowners don't spend time thinking about this, let alone scheming to somehow "keep the housing crisis going"…

Technically true but, and this is what makes democracy such a joke, poor people don't vote.

They vote for parties that bribe them with cheap crap and screw them behind the scenes.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#218

Post by imtringued »

Waterluvian wrote: post #63
MontyCarloHall wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For existing homeowners this isn't a crisis, it's a free paper money bonanza. Just by living in their houses home "owners" (most are heavily leveraged) "earn" 100k in paper money year in year out - magic! Is this appreciation consistent with the rest of the country, or areas with comparable quality of life? If you only have one home, real estate appreciation only makes you money if it’s higher for your house relati…

For the most part this is an important point. But there is a minor perk that a greatly appreciating house gives you considerably more equity to act as a large rainy day battery via a home equity line of credit or traditional loans backed by home equity. My home appreciated 20% last two years and while I hate the condition of the housing market, this unlocked a lot of equity years earlier than I expected it to.

That makes no sense. If the land was cheaper you could buy a more expensive house that is of higher quality. You don't need to fill the bags of the old land owner.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#219

Post by imtringued »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #168
bb88 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your house you purchased for $200,000 20 years ago is now worth $1.4M, say, that's $1.2M in profit. You could live in a smaller house worth $1M and still get $400k of profit you didn't have before.

ah, I see the light now

The young people working for that profit don't see it.

Re: I believe California is the dumping ground for America's homeless problem

#220

Post by imtringued »

trophycase wrote: post #157
Schnitz wrote: post #26

> Rather than asking "Who can we blame?" maybe we could start asking "How do we fix it?" Nobody talks about the hard truth: The homeownership rate in California is ~55% and therefore over half of Californians are heavily incentivized to keep the housing crisis going. For existing homeowners this isn't a crisis, it's a free paper money bonanza. Just by living in their houses home "owners" (most are heavily leveraged)…

What is your suggestion? That only 5% become homeowners/property owners and we're basically back to feudalism?

Land value taxes reduce the value of land and increase the value of work.
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