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Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

nytimes.com

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Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#21

Post by eschulz »

tetris11 wrote: post #12
cm2187 wrote: post #8

> One quarter of residents in the French capital now live in government-owned housing, part of an aggressive effort to keep lower-income Parisians — and their businesses — in the city. I think they meant "...and their votes"

expand?

The article mentions a woman who wept with joy when she received a "steal" of a lease for a new government owned building, and the article mentions that certain political parties have made this program a priority. Perhaps this woman will support such political parties with her vote in future elections.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#22

Post by dangus »

bko wrote: post #4

The problem with charging below market prices for anything is that it necessarily leads to a mismatch of supply and demand. So the question is how do you allocate that supply? One way is to have hidden costs. This could range from straight up bribes, to paid consultants to fill out a lot of forms or talk to the right people, to just knowing someone Another way is a lottery which benefits a tiny percentage of people.…

Basically, you’re assuming that this system is going to be like the underfunded and scarce public housing in the United States where a difficult to win lottery will be necessary to secure an apartment. In that sort of market of scarce supply, slumlords can overcharge for low quality rentals. But they couldn’t do that in a market where the government is offering a real alternative that you can actually get into. From the article it seems like the Parisian government has such a large supply of public housing that it is a serious market force that can influence the rest of the city and the makeup of its neighborhoods.

Your description of the situation sounds more like America where a tiny inventory of antiquated public housing units built ~40 years ago (the last time any American politicians cared to lift a finger to address poverty and inequality) are made available by a bleak lottery.

Just because the public housing system doesn’t work in America where it’s basically an afterthought doesn’t mean that it isn’t working in other places.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#23

Post by cm2187 »

tetris11 wrote: post #12
cm2187 wrote: post #8

> One quarter of residents in the French capital now live in government-owned housing, part of an aggressive effort to keep lower-income Parisians — and their businesses — in the city. I think they meant "...and their votes"

expand?

The socialists who control the city have a majority but not a structural one (Paris was voting conservative for a long time). The gentrification of Paris would normally deplete their electorate, so you can see their efforts to buy prime real estate at high price to convert it to social housing as a very expensive vote-buying exercise.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#24

Post by ecshafer »

bugglebeetle wrote: post #15
bko wrote: post #4

The problem with charging below market prices for anything is that it necessarily leads to a mismatch of supply and demand. So the question is how do you allocate that supply? One way is to have hidden costs. This could range from straight up bribes, to paid consultants to fill out a lot of forms or talk to the right people, to just knowing someone Another way is a lottery which benefits a tiny percentage of people.…

And yet Vienna is one of the most beautiful, livable cities in the world, with its masses of public housing, while major U.S. cities have homelessness crises and TV shows about house flipping for profit. Perhaps we should stop debating things based on the hokum of Econ 101 textbooks and look at what in the real world has actually worked (e.g. abolishing most forms of zoning, massive investments in public housing, rob…

The US also has a per capita GDP 50% higher than Austria ($52,131 vs $76,399). At $52,131 a year per capita GDP, Austria would be neatly in second to last place as the poorest state in the Union, as it would beat Mississippi at $47,190 but be beaten by West Virginia at $53,852. So perhaps the US policy is doing something correctly.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#25

Post by ekianjo »

ketzo wrote: post #18
cm2187 wrote: post #8

> One quarter of residents in the French capital now live in government-owned housing, part of an aggressive effort to keep lower-income Parisians — and their businesses — in the city. I think they meant "...and their votes"

People always say this like a gotcha, but aren’t politicians supposed to do stuff that they think people will vote for?

there are laws against giving financial incentives to voters... but they have been long forgotten

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#26

Post by Ragnarork »

bko wrote: post #4

The problem with charging below market prices for anything is that it necessarily leads to a mismatch of supply and demand. So the question is how do you allocate that supply? One way is to have hidden costs. This could range from straight up bribes, to paid consultants to fill out a lot of forms or talk to the right people, to just knowing someone Another way is a lottery which benefits a tiny percentage of people.…

> So the question is how do you allocate that supply?

To adress this specific question for Paris, they put an upper limit on your income to rent specific housing with lower rent.

I'll scale down your caricature of an example though, the offers you can see are usually 15% to 20% under market price, not 75% like you seem to imply.

Not exactly sure what is your point otherwise, the difference in terms of giving someone an apartment with a lower market rent vs. giving that money outright will eventually lead to the same thing, except that the former is also a way to curb the very high rent inflation (among other things), and results in both cases in a significant increase in purchasing power, at a given income.

> If we realized that with a system like this we're giving 1 out of 1k eligible people the equivalent of a 30k a year transfer

This is not equivalent because giving someone that money doesn't mean they'll chose to live inside Paris, and this is a measure that goes beyond financial support. It's also a city policy aimed at achieving a specific population distribution.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#27

Post by maeln »

tetris11 wrote: post #12
cm2187 wrote: post #8

> One quarter of residents in the French capital now live in government-owned housing, part of an aggressive effort to keep lower-income Parisians — and their businesses — in the city. I think they meant "...and their votes"

expand?

Not the same guy, but if a class of people have to move out of the city because they are being priced-out, they will not vote in this city anymore (but in their new city in the suburb), shifting the current political balance. The current Paris mayor is from the Parti Socialiste (left-wing / moderate left-wing - for France), and may get a lot of their vote from the working class people living in Parisian social housing. Therefor, they have an active interest in keeping them within the city.

The political theory is true but I have no idea if the people living in social housing do vote more for the current mayor though. So it is just theory.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#28

Post by wheybags »

ketzo wrote: post #18
cm2187 wrote: post #8

> One quarter of residents in the French capital now live in government-owned housing, part of an aggressive effort to keep lower-income Parisians — and their businesses — in the city. I think they meant "...and their votes"

People always say this like a gotcha, but aren’t politicians supposed to do stuff that they think people will vote for?

No, I want my politicians to declare what they want to do, and then I choose which one I agree with. I do not want them to get elected, then try to do what people want. That's backwards.

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#29

Post by theGnuMe »

dangus wrote: post #11

This article reminded me of a thought I’ve often had: that the USA is a great place to live for the upper middle class and above, but it’s one of the worst wealthy countries to live in when you’re poor. From the context of the USA it seems downright amazing to see a society where public housing isn’t automatically assumed to be a number of bad things: taxpayer waste, crime haven, and antiquated disrepair. The benefit…

>Our daily surroundings really shouldn’t be a race to the highest bidder for high-rent tenants like McDonald’s to come in, underpay employees, and poison local residents with junk food.

A good term I heard for this was "strip mine society".

Re: Paris preserves its mixed society by pouring billions into public housing

#30

Post by redandblack »

bko wrote: post #4

The problem with charging below market prices for anything is that it necessarily leads to a mismatch of supply and demand. So the question is how do you allocate that supply? One way is to have hidden costs. This could range from straight up bribes, to paid consultants to fill out a lot of forms or talk to the right people, to just knowing someone Another way is a lottery which benefits a tiny percentage of people.…

Market prices rarely (almost never) consider externalities - situations like this where it is a societal decision, it is difficult to define what we want, much less define a objective function that the market prices can optimize on.

Case in point - congestion pricing

I prefer excess housing / school / living infra which is subsidized by the society

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