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Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

economist.com

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Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#171

Post by rhacker »

api wrote: post #157
ryukafalz wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say a non-exclusionary city would work just as well. Tokyo is the most expansive city I can think of and they've managed to keep prices down. Still, fighting to make US cities more livable is a laudable goal.

It's a laudable goal but I have serious doubts about its achievability in cities that are already overpriced. Every single incentive leans in the direction of keeping prices high since not only would lower prices cost homeowners money but would also possibly cut into tax revenues and could financial ruin people who purchased under these high price regimes. It's a bit of a ratchet. Once the prices go high, it's very h…

Or raise rates. That's actually affecting housing prices. No one can sell at the price they wanted because no one wants a loan this crazy. Unfortunately this will have other consequences.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#172

Post by AlexandrB »

choko wrote: post #64
pochekailov wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We probably need some service (an app or a site) that gives clear instructions on how, where and when to register. Yes, it is harder for renters, but it is designed to be harder. This is to prevent renters from having political power and making homeowner's houses more expensive. One more reason to fight, from my point of view.

We have all that and more. There are even groups that seek people out to teach them to vote. When you file a change of address with the post office, they send you a packet with all kinds of moving resources including how to re-register. In addition, a really quick Google search gives you all you need to know to register and vote. I don't understand why some people pretend the process is difficult. If people still are…

I don't get why there's a "process" at all. In Canada, when I change my address with the CRA (our version of the IRS), my voter registration gets updated automatically. Why is there a separate step in the US? I've also voted when my CRA address was out-of-date at the time, and this was fine too as long as I brought government-issued ID or a recent bill sent to my new address.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#173

Post by namdnay »

sfe22 wrote: post #169
idkyall wrote: post #122

Housing in the US has gotten to where it is due to horrible laws effectively allowing total tax avoidance for landlords. Take some investment property. You buy it at some basis price, let's say 500k. You rent it out for 15k a year. Each year you can offset your rental income against deprecation of the property and property taxes - meaning, you pay no income tax on your rental income. ~30 years later, you've deprecate…

It is easy to pick an example like this to show the “bad” sides. But what is the alternative? If people had to pay inheritance tax on their family home, how many could not afford such a tax bill and would have to get rid of their family home to please the tax man. Regarding the cost basis rest that is so people can upgrade their house without having to pay a tax bill. This is just deferring the tax not avoiding it. W…

> If people had to pay inheritance tax on their family home, how many could not afford such a tax bill and would have to get rid of their family home to please the tax man.

so if they can't afford to pay tax on the windfall, they'd have to sell the house and buy a smaller one. is that the end of the world?

> Regarding the cost basis rest that is so people can upgrade their house without having to pay a tax bill

what they have in many european countries is that you can do this only on your primary residence. so you let people upgrade their homes, but not their rental properties

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#174

Post by [deleted] »

nopenopenopeno wrote: post #112
pochekailov wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Q1: Yes, there is. Once a professional politician sees more activity from renters, they will include the renter's interests into their agenda Q2: Yes, obviously there is a positive correlation. This is exactly why renters need to fight: stakes are against them. Current status quo is in favor of homeowners; it will not be possible to change it while being passive. Renters and homeowners have conflict of interests, the…

You have an incredibly naive impression of representative democracy and capitalist political economy. US politicians serve the rich, not only because they are the rich but also because they need the donations to even be able to run. This isn’t a mere hiccup but rather the entire point of the design.

[deleted]

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#175

Post by SamoyedFurFluff »

sfe22 wrote: post #169
idkyall wrote: post #122

Housing in the US has gotten to where it is due to horrible laws effectively allowing total tax avoidance for landlords. Take some investment property. You buy it at some basis price, let's say 500k. You rent it out for 15k a year. Each year you can offset your rental income against deprecation of the property and property taxes - meaning, you pay no income tax on your rental income. ~30 years later, you've deprecate…

It is easy to pick an example like this to show the “bad” sides. But what is the alternative? If people had to pay inheritance tax on their family home, how many could not afford such a tax bill and would have to get rid of their family home to please the tax man. Regarding the cost basis rest that is so people can upgrade their house without having to pay a tax bill. This is just deferring the tax not avoiding it. W…

I think inheriting property should absolutely force children out of their home unless they plan to actually live in it as their primary home immediately, and even if they do, they should be paying the same taxes as the rest of the neighborhood.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#176

Post by Loughla »

Spivak wrote: post #140
doliveira wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Election day not being a holiday in the USA is weird

Not being able to vote electronically is also really weird since ballots are only paper at the edge. Yes there are downsides, just like when you mail-in you give up non-repudiation, but the fact that it's not even an option is crazy. I personally would be more than happy to give up my personal ability to vote anonymously if I meant I could just sign up for a vote.gov account at the BMV, login, vote and be done with i…

I absolutely do not want electronic voting. I legitimately believe that system would be kept behind a black box, and would be far too likely and liable to be cheated and gamed. At least with a huge stack of paper that is stored for an approved number of years there is an option for independent verification.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#177

Post by 6510 »

pochekailov wrote: post #14

Nothing will change while the homeowners have more political power than the renters. Even in the cities where the renter population is bigger than the homeowners, such as in Seattle, half of the votes come from people of > 65 years old (all of whom are homeowners, likely more than one home). Young people simply won't vote at all. There is very little incentives for the young people to vote. Even if you cancel all the…

10-20 years seems fine. It doesn't have to happen overnight. To fast would create chaos and make it into new lame situations for people.

Gradual rent control with a point system works just fine.

Personally I would like to see renting [gradually] changed into lease/buy. That I've paid the value of the house 3 times now (and the construction cost 7 times) could mean I own at least some of the house? Doesn't seem unreasonable.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#178

Post by mildmotive »

seydor wrote: post #156

> Happily, they are at last starting to recognise the damage caused by these policies. No, nothing changed, if anything it got worst post covid. The only countries that can do something are singapore and china, who are rationally treating housing as a basic need similar to food. In the western world things will probably never change on that front. The boomers built houses because they knew they d be appreciating fore…

> The only countries that can do something are singapore and china, who are rationally treating housing as a basic need similar to food.

So why are people in China paying hefty loans for apartments that haven’t even been constructed yet? And now due to the housing bubble popping, construction has halted in so many parts of China that there is an epidemic of Chinese people who are refusing to pay their mortgages, and banks are refusing to let go of people’s money because fractional-reserve banking. China sure do have a serious housing crisis that’s arguably worse than that of the west.

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#179

Post by obblekk »

Have we considered just building new cities? It would be cool if the state could run a contest, have a rural county sign up to reform their zoning laws, and in exchange receive 100 year tax relief guarantees from the state to build a new city.

America used to build new cities from scratch all the time up until WW2. This creates competition between cities (new entrants) resulting in better policies all around.

And the best part is it results in more empty land becoming valuable, enabling either dense or suburban housing as desired (hopefully making it non partisan).

Seems to me primary barrier today is there’s no unincorporated land left in the US, so let’s create a system for allowing new incorporations to emerge somehow!

Re: Housing is at the root of many of the rich world’s problems (2020)

#180

Post by Loughla »

jimbob45 wrote: post #79
alistairSH wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure why you're being downvoted. Whether it's intentional or not, voting in the US is not always easy for several reasons... 1 - No national election day holiday, so wage-earners often have to forgo income to vote. 2 - Long lines, too few voting stations, exacerbate point 1 3 - Inconsistent voting laws as you cross municipal boundaries (mostly state to state). 3b - particularly WRT mail-in/absentee ballots. 4 - c…

1 - No national election day holiday, so wage-earners often have to forgo income to vote. PSA: You can register as a poll worker and work election day to guarantee you have time to vote. There's a high chance that your work will give you the time off to go work as a poll worker without it eating into your PTO (and you get paid to boot!).

Holy cow, not even a little bit. This is so, so middle- to upper-middle income centered it's not even funny.

1st you are assuming people have one employer to worry about, not multiple.

2nd you are assuming people have a set schedule daily or weekly.

3rd you are assuming people have PTO.

4th you are assuming the employer will give any amount of shit about volunteerism.

5th you are assuming they won't be given a point or docked for missing a shift.

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