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Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

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21–30 of 81 posts

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#22
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

So the government should serve the interests of those that aren’t residents to the detriment of those that do?

Yes, if you want to address the issue. Whether you should is another question. That is what the higher levels of government do. When the majority of citizens need something, you essentially use threat of violence to take it by force. You will never fix the "nimby problem" any other way.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#23

Rent control is dumb policy anyways. Now how can we get rid of nimby rule? Local governments have way too much influence on development, for better or worse. Perhaps sufficiently large development proposals must be entertained by the entire city or town rather than being unilaterally decided by a board - that seems like a sufficient compromise (at the expense of speed, but development is slow anyway given the appeals…

[flagged]

California basically did this[1]. Sadly though the desirable coastal areas are literally full and all spoken for and even without any real zoning anymore there’s nowhere to actually build. So you’re gonna need to eminent domain some Malibu mansions to make room for the non stop line of 1+5s from LA to SF.

It’s also interesting to me how many people propose increasing supply when there is nowhere to build, but can’t even think about reducing demand, say by reducing the all time record in migration. But that’s literally crimethink.

Sure the USA has a ton of empty space. But guess what, that’s because most people don’t want to live in those places. And the places where people do want to live like waterfront cities are geographically full.

[1] https://www.latimes.com/homeless-housing/story/2021-09-17/wh...

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#24
Good. People think rent control helps poor and middle class people find a good place to live, and punishes those evil, evil landlords. What it does in practice is discourage building new housing, and encourages evil, evil landlords to convert existing housing into condos they can sell. It drives people out of the city.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#25
Unpopular opinion: rent controls should be used only in times of drastic changes in housing supply or demand, and have short time limits equal to what it would take to resolve a housing crisis. Sudden change in demand or natural disaster destroys 20% of housing stock: 3-5 years of rent control. Otherwise we are just using politics to torque the market, "taking" capital from owners/landlords, and generating non-market incentives for renters. (see: master tenants, secret sub-leases, etc.)

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know why the local government is the best government? It's the government I can fire through voting. If the state had more power my votes would also have more power to change my community. I don't mean to imply abolishing the federal government in favor of local government. Just a redistribution of power that favors the local government more than the current status quo.

I’m not sure what your point is.

Typical issue of why you vote at all. Your influence to the result drop significantly from your town meeting, to local to state to federal. Obviously you cannot just have local gov otherwise it is impossible to coordinate some project. But some issues are better local.

The problem is which is which and if conflict how to resolve them. Not sure there is an answer.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#27

Good. People think rent control helps poor and middle class people find a good place to live, and punishes those evil, evil landlords. What it does in practice is discourage building new housing, and encourages evil, evil landlords to convert existing housing into condos they can sell. It drives people out of the city.

Rent control is the only thing that keeps dozens of my friends in San Francisco. Ages 22-75.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> Remove planning rights from local/city government entirely > You must use the government to essentially take land and repurpose it. Which government? In your first sentence we removed land planning from the local government.

I think he’s proposing urban dekulakization, so presumably the dispossession and redistribution would be enforced at the national level or at least by state level authorities.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#29
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

So the government should serve the interests of those that aren’t residents to the detriment of those that do?

Local governments have finite power given to them by state and federal government. So, the argument is more that state and federal government should actually exercise their authority to fix the underlying problem.

Abstractly hyper local optimization is suboptimal.

Re: Landlords Are Pushing the Supreme Court to End Rent Control

#30

This is the natural consequence of Citizen United (such a dishonest name). When those with money is allowed to leverage their wealth to disproportionately affect legal proceedings and lawmaking, it is just a step towards dystopia.

We’re rapidly allowing ourselves to slump to a moneycracy - one dollar = one vote.
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