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America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

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Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#181

Post by wpm »

lux-lux-lux wrote: post #134
postflopclarity wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's a great place to live and there will always be high demand. there would be more supply if not for restrictive zoning laws. and more supply = lower prices

SF has a relatively high ratio of housing units to population compared to other cities in the US and a 9.7% vacancy rate. By the numbers, it has an oversupply of housing.

By just those numbers, sure.

How many are homeless?

What does the median worker spend in money and time commuting from somewhere further?

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#182

Post by whynotminot »

triceratops wrote: post #130
whynotminot wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t want someone drifting through town in the local motel to be able to meaningfully vote to change the city I am rooted in.

Why would someone actually "drifting through" even bother voting? The odd weirdo might but that's not going to tip any elections. Even most long term residents legally entitled to vote don't make the effort.

I don’t know man but I also know that loopholes get exploited. I think local voting should be for actual locals.

To your point that so few people actually vote, it doesn’t take much to sway a local election.

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#183

Post by [deleted] »

jeffbee wrote: post #75
queuebert wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All things being equal, SF has some of the most desirable weather on the planet, so it will always have an high cost of living due to excess demand.

How do you square this bizarre and obviously false hypothesis with all the times that San Francisco did not have high cost of living, had declining population, etc?

[deleted]

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#184

Post by AlotOfReading »

taeric wrote: post #76

So many odd questions raised in this article. Literally each section seems to just hand wave a lot of things. And, look, I am all for attacking some regulations; but I have to confess the requirement for multiple sinks is going to be far down my list of regulations that have to go. Odd to see it be one of the top mentioned ones, here. The biggest question, for me, is raised when the complaint is dropped that we spend…

Density is also a problem caused by zoning/permitting regulations. SF, LA, and even NYC should all be more dense than they currently are. Not being able to increase their density just means that prices have gone up instead.

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#185

Post by queuebert »

jeffbee wrote: post #75
queuebert wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All things being equal, SF has some of the most desirable weather on the planet, so it will always have an high cost of living due to excess demand.

How do you square this bizarre and obviously false hypothesis with all the times that San Francisco did not have high cost of living, had declining population, etc?

What is obviously false about it? You can't just assert things as true. That's why the Democrats keep losing.

(See what I did there?)

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#186

Post by f30e3dfed1c9 »

ecshafer wrote: post #123
systemtest wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's by design that only people with stable housing can vote? I bet you loved pre-1965 America.

Actually yes, that is by design. There is a reason the US had property ownership as a requirement to vote in the constitution. Whether removing that requirement was correct or not is up for debate. But there is a distinction in a democracy between an active citizen and a passive citizen . An active citizen is someone that has skin in the game and is a willing participant in the process. A passive citizen is someone t…

"the US had property ownership as a requirement to vote in the constitution. Whether removing that requirement was correct or not is up for debate."

Not serious debate.

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#187

Post by lern_too_spel »

ecshafer wrote: post #123
systemtest wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's by design that only people with stable housing can vote? I bet you loved pre-1965 America.

Actually yes, that is by design. There is a reason the US had property ownership as a requirement to vote in the constitution. Whether removing that requirement was correct or not is up for debate. But there is a distinction in a democracy between an active citizen and a passive citizen . An active citizen is someone that has skin in the game and is a willing participant in the process. A passive citizen is someone t…

It was because they thought that landowners would direct the votes of the people who lived on that land. The same reason was given for not allowing women to vote. https://shec.ashp.cuny.edu/items/show/1645

This comes directly from a historical British restriction on voting rights that in turn is an artifact of feudalism. https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_2_1s3....

Ancient democracies, including those of Greek city states like Athens, restricted voting to landowners because prior to the invention of the printing press, only aristocrats could understand the issues being voted on.

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#188

Post by potato3732842 »

ecshafer wrote: post #140
mothballed wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a snowball effect with zoning. I specifically sought out a place zoned with no building code checks and hardly any zoning. I value my right to die in a fire a lot more than I value my right to have the jack-boot enter my own property and tell me he knows best. People like me go to places with fairly free zoning. The jack boot lickers go to places with restricted zoning. Once one has a majority it jus…

Building Codes and Zoning are orthogonal concepts. Japan has more lax zoning than the US at large more more stringent building codes.

In "communism works because the cows are spherical, friction is 0 and gravity is 10" example land sure.

In reality building code is how a huge amount of back handed regulation is done. When the powers that be can't make a particular rule, because of other laws, or because of precedent to the contrary, or because the peasants wouldn't stand for it, what they do is they adopt a ridiculous code and then slap a "can be waived at the discretion of board X" on it. This way they can make the thing they don't like a non-starter economically for most people.

In my city you can park a semi trailer as storage. But it counts as a "structure" and because it's not a commercially manufactured shed, car port, stick framed garage or litany of other exemptions you have to go through the "everything else" process which includes all the "normal code shit" that any other non-exempt structure would hav to go through like an engineered foundation and snow loads and all sorts of other stuff that's just inappropriate. They have a similar set of BS they use to prevent DIYers from erecting kit buildings.

Re: America could have $4 lunch bowls like Japan but for zoning laws

#189

Post by topspin »

fzeroracer wrote: post #171
topspin wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> imposing a vacancy tax That might help a little, but you won't notice. Beating such taxes is done with low value businesses. A mattress store is a typical case, good for holding larger spaces with almost no capital cost: a low overhead business used to hold a retail property until values appreciate. Smaller spaces are held with little clothing stores nobody shops at, or wire transfer shops and such. There is a plet…

I don't disagree, but even a low overhead business is still going to be better than an empty storefront (since it means creating some business and employment than none) and a reasonable % of said vacant businesses will be turned into decent value for the community. It's something especially apparent because even the local mattress stores have closed and left said space vacant.

Ok, but you're not going to get a nifty $4 lunch bowl shop. The properties are held until Starbucks or H&R Block or whatever wants to expand. Maybe said tax makes the mattress store reopen with its one minimum wage cashier poking at their phone all day, but you won't get more than that. The investors are holding out for the big money.

The business model works because when a buyer appears looking for numerous sites for expansion, they can deal with a professional investor group that can close deals in a cinch. This greatly lowers costs, because otherwise said buyer has to employ a small army of expensive people and take years to acquire or develop properties themselves. The buyer pays a premium for the value of foregoing all that. The price covers all the years of expenses; minimum wage labor, taxes, upkeep, and a good deal of profit, after years or even decades of squatting.

Nowhere in any of this is there someone with dreams of $4 lunch bowl shops.

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