Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo • Hacker News Board

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#151

Post by Fauntleroy » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:32 PM UTC

legitster wrote: post #46

I've grown a little bit more skeptical of what can realistically be achieved by the passive nature of YIMBY-ism. In Portland, they passed some radical new zoning laws a few years ago that allowed anyone, anywhere the ability to zone ADUs on their property. And the cost to get permits is almost nothing. I have lots of friends and family in the area with property. But not a single one has added an ADU. It seems like it…

It's amusing to me that anyone would think a random smattering of ADUs would do anything at all to push the needle when it comes to housing. This is like fixing linter warnings (but not even doing that!) instead of building an entirely new section of an app. We need the latter.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#152

Post by rayiner » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:33 PM UTC

wwweston wrote: post #29

dkjaudyeqooe wrote: post #4

Instead of getting tangled up in social issues, liberal politicians should be prioritizing housing, infrastructure and government services supporting people's economic activity of all kinds. Delivering better lives for people, and having the courage to stand up to vested interests, from house owners to corporations, would create a huge and lasting political win across a broad section of the electorate.

That's pretty much where liberal politicians end up targeting most of their policymaking and even a sizable portion of their campaign platform (as demonstrated in the Harris platform). Yet "tangled up in social issues" remains a popular misconception. Why?

> Yet "tangled up in social issues" remains a popular misconception. Why?

It’s not a “misconception.” Democrats choose to spend their political capital changing the status quo on social issues. For example, Americans overwhelmingly oppose affirmative action: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/06/16/americans...

Affirmative action was banned in California in 1996. Which party tried to repeal the ban in 2020? Republicans didn’t pass a law to ban affirmative action even more!

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#153

Post by MattGaiser » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:33 PM UTC

hollerith wrote: post #116

MattGaiser wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Home owners are by far the majority, so battling home owners is an easy ticket to defeat.

Home owners are the minority in San Francisco, so why in your opinion are prices so high there?

What does the voting population look like?

Where I am in Canada, we typically do not prioritize canvassing neighbourhoods with more renters as they usually don’t vote.

I imagine that tenant rights and rent control transform many renters into essentially homeowners for purposes beyond the asset itself. They also aren’t impacted by prices.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#154

Post by legitster » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:33 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #88

legitster wrote: post #46

I've grown a little bit more skeptical of what can realistically be achieved by the passive nature of YIMBY-ism. In Portland, they passed some radical new zoning laws a few years ago that allowed anyone, anywhere the ability to zone ADUs on their property. And the cost to get permits is almost nothing. I have lots of friends and family in the area with property. But not a single one has added an ADU. It seems like it…

As someone who owns a second house on a farm that has two rental units in it, I’m skeptical of attempts to expand ‘tenant rights’ in New York. I had a tenant who decided that he did not have to pay the rent, it took months of trying to reason with him, we hired a lawyer and went through the process which took several months, in the end the tenant stayed on a few months past what would have been the eviction date but…

My dad is landlord of an 8-plex in a small town. My brother is a social worker in a big city. When they get together and talk it's amazing how much their jobs overlap. So much of the job as a small time landlord these days is dealing with drug abuse, interpersonal problems, police, social services, housing authorities, etc.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#155

Post by PaulHoule » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:34 PM UTC

unyttigfjelltol wrote: post #43

avidiax wrote: post #9

I think the author has it quite backwards, at least as it comes to housing. Politicians are beholden to the members of their district, not would-be members. Sure, more affordable housing would benefit many people, but it wouldn't benefit the members of the district, particularly the wealthy and powerful, since more affordable housing is very nearly equivalent to real estate values decreasing (at the very least, as pe…

We live in a nation where grown-up children systematically are, in a way, turned into economic refugees fleeing the high-cost areas where they were born and their parents live. There are lots of people that care deeply about promoting housing abundance, more than enough to be a political force. The real problem is-- this is a problem of a diffuse absence . There is, generally, no simple focused location to complain a…

My son has been trying to meet people his own age around Ithaca and struggling but has been overcoming from his own effort with some help from his friends like me and my fox [1]

Of course the early 20s demo is dominated by college students which has some positive but also negative effects. He found it was easy to meet boomers at rock concerts and poker tournaments but once he cracked the code of meeting people his own age he was told by townies that townies leave because they can’t afford the rent. It is one thing to move on to seek fame and fortune but if you’re going to be one of the people who construct and maintain housing (can’t outsource that work to India, won’t be replaced by LLMs) it is a step down to move to a blighted area where you can afford to live.

[1] shapeshifting lessons taught him how to be an ambivert like myself

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#156

Post by scoofy » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:34 PM UTC

grumpy-de-sre wrote: post #91

nimish wrote: post #7

Old people are 'aging in place' instead of cultivating the new generation and it really, really shows

I'm not sure if democracy has the tools to adequately deal with this tbh, at-least in the short-to-medium term. I really hope we can find a way to make voters actually believe an abundant future is possible, and that it'll benefit them and their families. It's the biggest difference I see in societies like China, there's this pervasive optimism about technology, progress and abundance (~700 million people have first…

We have the tools, it's just going to be inter-generational warfare, and nobody really wants to say it out loud.

The bigger the housing crisis gets, the more people are going to change things on the state level instead of the local level.

This isn't a pendulum shifting event, it's a cascade, and that's why Abundance is doing so well, and that's why things are getting ugly on the left.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#157

Post by wormlord » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:34 PM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #140

wormlord wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are reformist policies that work and actions that can be taken on the local level to help alleviate some of these problems. But they are not robust long-term solutions. > a few years things largely went back to normal The US is deporting random immigrants to a concentration camp in El Salvador without due process claiming all of them are "gang members" with zero evidence. If you are unable to tie the expansion…

> But they are not robust long-term solutions. Why not? Sure, they could be undone, but that's true for any law in a democracy. > The US is deporting random immigrants to a concentration camp in El Salvador without due process claiming all of them are "gang members" with zero evidence. Got some bad news for you if you think abuses of executive power like this aren't largely normal here. Yes, it sucks, but my point wa…

> Why not? Sure, they could be undone, but that's true for any law in a democracy.

Not a democracy, and you just answered your own question. They can be undone because the people do not wield absolute power. They can be overturned by the state government, or federal government, or local lobbying groups.

> Yes, it sucks, but my point was that the doomers couldn't disentangle a few very bad economic years from their highly motivated belief that the whole rotten system is gonna come crashing down Any Day Now, I Swear.

I never said the whole system was going to come crashing down. I said Liberalism is over.

> Got some bad news for you if you think abuses of executive power like this aren't largely normal here.

I don't understand your point. You acknowledge that things are bad and also seem to acknowledge that they are getting worse, but you also claim that I am being "doomer". I am simply stating that whatever remained of the liberal framework, like:

- separation of powers

- due process

- representative democracy

- constitutional law

Is going bye-bye. I don't think it is "doomerism" when it is literally happening right now and has arguably been happening since the GWOT. I think you just want to be contrarian and look at everything bad happening and feel superior because you are aloof about it.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#158

Post by Herring » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:35 PM UTC

TulliusCicero wrote: post #89

wormlord wrote: post #31

Probably gonna get downvoted for quoting Lenin on this site -- but he nailed this 120 years ago in "What is to be done?". We are witnessing the collapse of Liberalism in real-time. Liberalism has outlived its usefulness as a tool of containing class conflict. The US ruling class has nearly consolidated absolute power and is disposing of Liberalism because it was only ever a tool used for their benefit . This is not j…

Nah, this is definitely still solvable. Specifically looking at housing for example, I believe Austin and Minneapolis have seen some good progress. Your rhetoric sounds like the doomerism I constantly heard around 2009 during the great recession, ala "THIS time capitalism's done for good! No coming back from this one!" And then after a few years things largely went back to normal and the doomers pretended they'd neve…

The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. Americans (esp white Americans) have a lot of individualist, anti-collectivist, anti-government cultural attitudes. The last time a situation like this happened, it took a Great Depression and intense widespread economic pain for them to snap out of it.

So what is it gonna take for Americans to demand universal healthcare? Idk, but 1 pandemic didn't do it. Maybe 3-5? Similarly real (inflation-adjusted) wage growth has been largely stagnant for most American workers, so eventually things will get bad enough, but not today and not tomorrow.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#159

Post by PaulHoule » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:36 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #135

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not for $10k? How about $100k?

That results in even more property tax I have to pay. People should want higher land prices due to growing incomes and business opportunities, not solely due to lack of housing supply. The former is sustainable, the latter is either a tourist trap or a short term game of musical chairs.

People are fooled to think it is OK to pay an inflated price for a house even if it means you struggle with the mortgage and taxes because you will sell to a greater fool…. But that perception is cracking.

Leftists in Ithaca have learned that high property taxes drive up the rent and voted down a bloated school budget because they realized that we all pay taxes.

Re: Abundance isn't going to happen unless politicians are scared of the status quo

#160

Post by gs17 » Thu, Mar 27, 2025, 6:36 PM UTC

ReptileMan wrote: post #81

e40 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>* There's a general fear of being a landlord. Tenants have a lot of legal rights, and the risk of inviting someone onto your property who could start squatting or doing drugs and not being able to evict them is beyond the pale for most families.* This is a big problem in a lot of places. It's really hard for cities to strike a good balance between renters and owners, and I think few do it well. Especially for the ed…

The balance simple - renters have total rights as long as they pay on time and there is no damage on the property except normal wear and tear and 0 when when not paying. You as landlord can't say anything as long as the property is not damaged for the duration of the contract. You always renegotiate at market rates. There is no concept of squatting and evictions are fast. That's it. Works like a charm. No bullshits l…

> as long as the property is not damaged

According to who? Landlords already tend to exaggerate to try to keep your security deposit, tenants would have no motivation to admit to damages after the lease ends. If the answer is "go to court", then "evictions are fast" will have to be amended.