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Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

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Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#121

Post by lokar »

Schiendelman wrote: post #116
lokar wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure why people are downvoting (without commenting), but I agree. The main selling point of prop13 was a real problem: rapidly increasing values were driving up taxes so fast that long time residents (of modest means) were being forced out. I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable to have some policy that attempts to protect people living in their primary residence from rapid tax increases they can’t afford.

So people were getting so wealthy that they couldn't pay the property tax on their wealth. Yes. The problem is, if you let them decide to tax other people instead of themselves for the spending they themselves approve , they will.

I don’t think you read my comment very carefully

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#122

Post by lokar »

MarkusQ wrote: post #115
lokar wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure why people are downvoting (without commenting), but I agree. The main selling point of prop13 was a real problem: rapidly increasing values were driving up taxes so fast that long time residents (of modest means) were being forced out. I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable to have some policy that attempts to protect people living in their primary residence from rapid tax increases they can’t afford.

That makes it sound like the increase was due to some inexorable natural force. California's per capita budget is over twice Arizona's, and they're running a huge deficit on top of that. If taxes are too high, cut taxes. If that means you need to cut spending, cut spending. But don't play "hey, let's tax the other guy!" games and expect that to work.

Prop13 was a big tax cut. The people behind it were minimal government conservative libertarians.

And the state did slash spending in the years following. In particular funding for the university system was hit very hard.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#123

Post by refurb »

lokar wrote: post #105
stouset wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think the goal of Prop 13 is laudable, a few reforms would cut some of the biggest downsides: it should be be for primary residences, where the named owner is the primary resident. This would eliminate the tax break for commercial property, prevent it from being abused for second homes, and avoid the property trust shenanigans that have allowed some properties to change hands without a reset in the taxes paid…

I’m not sure why people are downvoting (without commenting), but I agree. The main selling point of prop13 was a real problem: rapidly increasing values were driving up taxes so fast that long time residents (of modest means) were being forced out. I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable to have some policy that attempts to protect people living in their primary residence from rapid tax increases they can’t afford.

This is a solved problem.

Let people defer increases until their house is sold. This what many states do.

It’s seems insane that we “protect” people whose property taxes are going up because their home is getting so valuable

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#124

Post by tikhonj »

bingohbangoh wrote: post #82
kfarr wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And don’t forget prop 13, there’s negative incentive for property to change hands and develop.

Do people really think that if we revoked Prop 13 that other taxes would go down with the new money from property taxes? Or do we think that property taxes would go up while other taxes stay put? This feels like the argument at play when people criticize Prop 13. Not saying it’s good but California hasn’t ever cut taxes meaningfully and I’m not convinced raising property taxes would solve anything. California would s…

Prop 13 massively distorts the real estate market and creates some strong incentives for home owners. Those distortions and incentives would go away regardless of whether abolishing Prop 13 led to a net increase or decrease in total taxes.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#125

Post by burningChrome »

Just started reading Shawn Levy's book, "The Castle on Sunset: Life, Death, Love, Art, and Scandal at Hollywood's Chateau Marmont" which relates the history of the hotel, but I found the history of Hollywood and LA fascinating. Its a huge part of the story of the hotel and development of the areas surrounding the hotel.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#126

Post by epistasis »

MikeNotThePope wrote: post #75
epistasis wrote: post #28

It's amazing how little has changed in recent years in LA. The massive downzoning of the 1980s had its effect: prevent efficient land use, and channel money into the hands of landlords and homeowners from all newcomers. LA is a ridiculously unaffordable place to live, not because it's nice, but because of an artificial shortage of built space, due to a monopoly on the permission to build.

I have a dumb question. What is the eventual of efficient land use? Say we bulldoze a bunch of single family homes and get 10x as dense. Now we have 10x as many people per square kilometer. Is that an efficient use of land? Will there be someone saying at 10x population density that it's an inefficient use of space? If yes, what would they propose instead?

There's a really great way to think about this that doesn't get enough attention: land rents.

Some plots of land are very valuable due to their location, what you can access, etc. It's pretty straightforward to find out what the monthly cost of land is in any area, either from simple regressions on property values, or empty lot sales, etc.

When the land rent starts to excessively exceed average income of number of households allowed to live on that plot of land, that's pretty inefficient.

Owning land is society letting you say to other people: you're not allowed here. When we restrict land us so that people can not figure out their best use of it, eg 4 families building townhouses together, we start to restrict access to opportunity and basic economic freedom.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#127

Post by tikhonj »

syspec wrote: post #60
kfarr wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And don’t forget prop 13, there’s negative incentive for property to change hands and develop.

Do you own your home? Here in Ca? You know that property tax is 1.4ish % and goes up by 2% a year, pretty much no matter what? On a 1.5M house, that's starting at 17K a year and each year it goes up 2%, so it compounds. That's 17k a year Just to stay in your own home. People who don't pay property taxes here in ca, act like prop 13 means zero property taxes

I do own a house in California and I pay closer to $30k in property taxes. The previous owners of my house paid $7k. My neighbor—who has a bigger, more expensive house!—pays $9k.

It's pretty clear that this kind of tax policy is going to totally mess up the housing market. It's not the only factor, but it's a big one.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#128

Post by tikhonj »

lokar wrote: post #105
stouset wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think the goal of Prop 13 is laudable, a few reforms would cut some of the biggest downsides: it should be be for primary residences, where the named owner is the primary resident. This would eliminate the tax break for commercial property, prevent it from being abused for second homes, and avoid the property trust shenanigans that have allowed some properties to change hands without a reset in the taxes paid…

I’m not sure why people are downvoting (without commenting), but I agree. The main selling point of prop13 was a real problem: rapidly increasing values were driving up taxes so fast that long time residents (of modest means) were being forced out. I don’t think it’s entirely unreasonable to have some policy that attempts to protect people living in their primary residence from rapid tax increases they can’t afford.

It really isn't. You could—and we did!—solve that problem by letting people defer property tax payments or borrow against their equity. California literally has a property tax postponment program for seniors. If we just wanted to keep people from being pushed out of their homes by rising house prices, we'd just expand that program.

The point of Prop 13 is to let people have their cake and eat it too: you get to keep the equity you gain from increased housing prices, but not pay the property tax that comes with them.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#129

Post by WD-42 »

epistasis wrote: post #28

It's amazing how little has changed in recent years in LA. The massive downzoning of the 1980s had its effect: prevent efficient land use, and channel money into the hands of landlords and homeowners from all newcomers. LA is a ridiculously unaffordable place to live, not because it's nice, but because of an artificial shortage of built space, due to a monopoly on the permission to build.

I was just down there and saw multiple massive development projects going on. Like huge new neighborhoods.

Of course they aren’t in LA proper. But it seems like people that want to live in SoCal want the suburbs. You talk like LA is this artificially small place except that it’s more like a neighborhood in the middle of sprawl at an almost unimaginable scale.

Not saying any of this is good. In fact it’s terrible. Personally I feel like the entire LA metro area is about as close as you can get to a real paradise lost on earth. Maybe one of the most naturally beautiful places on the planet, bulldozed over for a maze of 6 lane uncrossable suburban streets and cookie cutter McMansions.

Re: Watch Los Angeles get built, one building at a time (1880–2026)

#130

Post by WD-42 »

wathef wrote: post #52

Los Angeles had the largest public transportation network in the United States until we paved over it[1]. We had over 1,300 miles! You could've gone from Huntington Beach to Downtown and all the way up to Burbank. You can see many of the maps of Los Angeles at the public library[2]. I don't live there anymore, love that place though. [1] - https://www.pbssocal.org/shows/lost-la/from-rail-to-roads-an... [2] - https://…

Fun fact: this is the plot of the movie “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”
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