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What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

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Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#201

Post by satvikpendem »

dogcomplex wrote: post #193
satvikpendem wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really isn't that simple, because again, no one really can say how it is so simple, merely that it is, somehow. Economists also talk about this point often, and they also can't agree, generally speaking, on how to, or even if to, reduce the inequality gap. The best solutions I've seen are land value taxes, inheritance and estate taxes, and taxes on loans backed by stock; and among the worst are unrealized capital…

And pretty-much any of those taxes would help the situation, so long as ultimately they boil down to the rich paying more per year than their profit margins and therefore shrinking inequality (redistributed to the people). This problem isn't complicated because it's intellectually challenging. This problem is complicated because the balance of power is overwhelmingly favorable to the rich, and they have many means to…

> This problem isn't complicated because it's intellectually challenging. This problem is complicated because the balance of power is overwhelmingly favorable to the rich, and they have many means to both disrupt the conversation in intellectual circles and to block any political means of making these necessary changes.

It can be both, one does not preclude the other. As I mentioned in my other comments, one can't simply adjust taxes without thinking about higher order effects, and it takes intellectual capacity to even think about what to tax in the first place and how, in order to reduce these effects.

> See economist Richard D. Wolff for extremely simple answers to the above problem.

Where should I be looking specifically?

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#202

Post by kfarr »

kshacker wrote: post #181
nemo44x wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it collapse? There’s insatiable demand for extreme limited property. Interest rate hikes may lower the price of property but the interest will rise proportionately. Do people really think at sone point no one will want premium property and I’ll finally get it cheap? Of course that will never happen.

You can twist the supply demand imbalance only so much. Go farther than required for longer than required, and some cracks will eventually show up. Like they did for Silicon Valley bank. So it is hard to say when those cracks appear since the global market is quite a big market and can sustain imbalances for a long time, but then the bigger the bubble the bigger the crash. Foreigner limits, tax on no. Residents, star…

I think the difference here is fundamentally there is insufficient supply for the demand of housing globally, or at least US, UK and EU. The previous generation made new builds extremely difficult or impossible in many jurisdictions.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#203

Post by satvikpendem »

OnlineGladiator wrote: post #200
satvikpendem wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want to nitpick that every solution isn't as simple as fizzbuzz then there's no real point having a discussion. No, that's the entire point of having the discussion. If the solution can't answer even these types of questions, then there's no point having the discussion, because it breaks down even upon initial examination. > This is what the IRS is for. It's one of the only government organizations that actu…

> but even they are not going to tax unrealized capital gains You are completely missing the point of the conversation you started. Everything we're discussing is a hypothetical. In this scenario, they would tax that and everything else. Anyway, I don't think that you're arguing in good faith and I'm moving on with my day. Cheers.

Okay, no worries. It seems you wanted to reply to me but then are unable to show anything regarding your viewpoint when I ask questions about it, even, yes, in the hypothetical, so it's not worth my time to ask any questions either.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#204

Post by adverbly »

medion wrote: post #143

The answer is very simple - more construction - and to do so, we need deregulation, density, training and innovation.

> more construction - and to do so, we need deregulation, density, training and innovation.

Doesn't even need to be that complex: land value tax would do it(and solve many other issues as economists have been saying for decades). Land scarcity shifts late-stage market incentives away from building to rent seeking and speculation. LVT would fix these incentives. It is badly needed in most first world countries at this point.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#205

Post by canadianfella »

kshacker wrote: post #181
nemo44x wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it collapse? There’s insatiable demand for extreme limited property. Interest rate hikes may lower the price of property but the interest will rise proportionately. Do people really think at sone point no one will want premium property and I’ll finally get it cheap? Of course that will never happen.

You can twist the supply demand imbalance only so much. Go farther than required for longer than required, and some cracks will eventually show up. Like they did for Silicon Valley bank. So it is hard to say when those cracks appear since the global market is quite a big market and can sustain imbalances for a long time, but then the bigger the bubble the bigger the crash. Foreigner limits, tax on no. Residents, star…

[dead]

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#206

Post by AmericanChopper »

pcthrowaway wrote: post #169
UncleOxidant wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 1) the immigration rate is so high it isn't enough to keep up That could be addressed by making home building a priority and by relaxing regulations like zoning. Allow more infill. > 3) The government doesn't want to do anything about it because immigration is how they're keeping down wages That's not the only reason to support immigration. Canada, as is the case with most western nations, is facing a demographic c…

> That could be addressed by making home building a priority and by relaxing regulations like zoning. Allow more infill. Unfortunately, it seems like incentives aren't aligned with the people responsible for zoning and regulation, for that to happen. Incumbent homeowners for whatever reason are better organized at mobilizing around their political interests

There’s another reason that local governments don’t embrace intensification, which is that they will be responsible for building the infrastructure to support it. Take a look at Jakarta where zoning laws focus heavily on intensification. Housing is cheap, but power cuts are normal, most of the city smells like sewage because you have sewage flowing into storm water infrastructure, the city regularly floods, and parts of it are sinking into to ocean because unregulated ground water extraction has caused meters worth of subsistence in some areas (the roads are also terrible, but surprisingly the city has been making very good progress in that area at least). Now you can manage all of those things, but it requires competence and proper management of resources. Something local governments tend to not be good at, and why would any of them want to take the risk? Expensive housing and bad traffic is the status quo, flooding you could probably blame on climate change, but power cuts, lack of running water and a city that smells like shit would cost too many people their jobs.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#207

Post by satvikpendem »

alexashka wrote: post #196
amelius wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the rich get richer (...) and the poor get poorer It's always the same story. Can't we just make the economy more fair by saying that the wealth gap must at least be smaller than some value or else the rich will pay (taxes) to make it so?

> Can't we just make the economy more fair by... No. When people say they want fairness, they are being disingenuous. They want a lot of the fair that benefits them and a little bit of the fair that makes their life worse. That's not what fair means. Would you want fair if it made your life a lot worse? The only honest answer is no :) Thus, we have what we have.

One interesting point regarding this is, ask anyone in the first world whether they want the same fairness as those not in the first world, ie if we added up all of the wages of everyone on the planet and redistributed them equally, the first worlder would be much much poorer than where they started off.

Of course, I do support bringing up the average wages in each country overall, which is precisely what capitalism has been doing for the past century of industrialized progress.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#208

Post by yeahsure22 »

tptacek wrote: post #162
roenxi wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The WEF is in fact not just a big social club either. People go their to coordinate, discuss policy and make deals. They aren't going for the merch. They are there to lobby and influence, dare I say, the World Economy. I mean, https://www.weforum.org/focus/the-great-reset . They're not talking about the weather. They're looking at the future and coordinating a response. EDIT https://www.weforum.org/great-reset was a…

The WEF is if anything less than a social club. It's a series of social events . It's nothing. The only potential energy it has at all is people imputing it power on threads about how it's the secret architect of the global economy. That is not something you can say about the BJP, which has real power.

[dead]

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#209

Post by ClumsyPilot »

watrami wrote: post #103

It seems like it's the same story everywhere I look. Housing is the main driver of inequality and there is little change happening. We have the same problem here in Germany. I am currently living in Munich to finish my CS Master's at TUM and build a startup, and it is absolutely impossible to find anything remotely affordable. I am supported by two startup scholarships and make enough to get by, but no landlord even…

> still gets rejected either for her financial situation or because the rental contract is already set to increase 8% each year - which we simply cannot afford. And it's not just Munich. Every city in Germany has this problem.

The logical step, when individuals cannot afford their own rent, companies that need workers will be providing housing to their workers. And they will be able to evict them whenever they feel like it.

Then we will finally return to feudalism in all but name- you will have a lord, live on his land , and he will be able to control your life far beyond what a job normally does.

Re: What broke Sweden? Real estate bust exposes big divide

#210

Post by ClumsyPilot »

kfarr wrote: post #202
kshacker wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can twist the supply demand imbalance only so much. Go farther than required for longer than required, and some cracks will eventually show up. Like they did for Silicon Valley bank. So it is hard to say when those cracks appear since the global market is quite a big market and can sustain imbalances for a long time, but then the bigger the bubble the bigger the crash. Foreigner limits, tax on no. Residents, star…

I think the difference here is fundamentally there is insufficient supply for the demand of housing globally, or at least US, UK and EU. The previous generation made new builds extremely difficult or impossible in many jurisdictions.

There is financial fuckerage driving prices far beyond what normal dynamics would allow.
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