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Why Britain doesn’t build

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Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#281

Post by alexdunmow »

segamegazord wrote: post #179
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Elections are largely monopolized by older people who mostly tend to be homeowners...the entire system is rigged Homeowners, irrespective of age, vote more. This is in part enabled by material comforts. But there may be other layers of causation. The first two are problematic per se (though I'm uncertain of the effect size). But the last is fundamental--if someone can vote but can't care to, they're not going to ha…

Countries like Australia have compulsory voting and are still suffering the same issues. You are right - there are other layers of causation.

We even have preferential voting. The problem is nearly two-thirds of MPs - out of 144 of them - own more than one property. Which is more than three times the national average: less than 20 per cent of Australians own more than one property.

Even the so-called "left leaning" party are landlords.

We are run by the landed gentry. They'll continue looking out for their own. Houses are the safest asset as they're practically 100% Government backed.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#282

Post by midoridensha »

anovikov wrote: post #106
lll-o-lll wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the whole western world at the same time. The same policies, the same social outcomes. It makes me question whether there is any real democracy; did we all just happen to make the exact same decisions in lock step since the 70s by incredible coincidence? And it’s not as if the eventual negative outcomes of housing costs continually outstripping wage growth weren’t obvious and growing year on year. Who is actuall…

I can't see a problem here. It only happens because (slightly) more than half of voters are happy with their housing situation and prefer it stay the way it is (that is, perpetually increasing prices, so they can earn equity => retire). They consciously vote for people who ensures just that. There is no failure of democracy here, but rather a good indication of it's strength.

It's true that the people are getting what they're voting for, but I wouldn't call this "not a failure of democracy", when the voters are causing their society to decay and die slowly because of their own short-sightedness.

However, we haven't exactly seen better systems of governance, plus not all democratic societies are filled with such short-sighted idiots like we see in the US, and those societies are doing much better long-term and stability-wise.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#283

Post by pas »

dahwolf wrote: post #194

In the Netherlands we don't really have a big NIMBY issue and we still can't keep up supply with demand. Supply is complicated and not just restricted by zoning. One key thing to understand is that private companies build homes, not governments. And if it's not profitable to do so, it will simply stop. And if not at least 75% of the project is sold beforehand, the project is stopped altogether. And this is how our go…

one of the big problems is runaway costs (and not just due to grid upgrades and need for new transport lines, but because construction is still ridiculously labor intensive and undercapitalized), simply put it's at the same time too small scale and complex (and fragmented) to industrialize.

only scale can get the same quality for lower price. but construction happens in small batches. even though the inputs are very similar, there's no aggregate market force pushing down costs (as it's not trivial to substitute local inputs with cheaper ones).

and to get bigger scale folks would need to accept new technologies and of course new building arrangements.

and, obviously, no developed democratic government wants to risk such a big project.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#284

Post by ttymck »

bobthepanda wrote: post #229
tormeh wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is definitely it. It's a question of demographics. The developed world used to be for young people because people there were mostly young. Now decisions are taken by and for old people, and those of us who aren't are afterthoughts. A good example of this is the age at which our constitutions were drafted vs how old politicians are now. This is also the case in Norway but I think the US is a more relatable exampl…

The millenial generation is now the largest cohort in the United States. The issue is that generally, it takes a while for a cohort to build up political power.

Especially when political power is almost exclusively financial.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#285

Post by techer »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #270
tmnvix wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would guess that few countries have the type of situation that exists in the US where a driver's licence is almost essential in order to go about daily life. Many people in the UK don't bother with a licence. It can be prohibitively expensive when you consider the costs of lessons, a vehicle, and of the licence itself.

Many people in the UK don't bother with a licence. Eh. "Many" is such a vague term. Like, 5% could be considered many. UK is a driving country, period. where a driver's licence is almost essential in order to go about daily life. This is true in all highly developed countries if you live outside the largest cities. You need to drive. It is baked in the cost of your life. Renting is much cheaper outside of the city, b…

“in the 5 years from 2015 to 2019, an average of 74% of people in England had a full driving licence“

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#286

Post by renewiltord »

Remember: regulations are written in blood. You can't simply build things willy nilly. The Grenfell Tower fire is a recent and stark reminder of what happens when you don't apply a lot of trained and expert input into things.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#287

Post by midoridensha »

leoedin wrote: post #76
lll-o-lll wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the whole western world at the same time. The same policies, the same social outcomes. It makes me question whether there is any real democracy; did we all just happen to make the exact same decisions in lock step since the 70s by incredible coincidence? And it’s not as if the eventual negative outcomes of housing costs continually outstripping wage growth weren’t obvious and growing year on year. Who is actuall…

It's an interesting observation. I'm part of a few UK and Canadian regional subreddits, and the topics of conversation are often very similar. House prices are too high, we need to build more, the government is favouring boomers, the economy is stagnating, we need more manufacturing and less real estate speculation etc. What's particularly interesting is that often in the UK ones people paint Canada as being far bett…

>The various stories I've seen about Japan - with low rents, falling house prices and large numbers of abandoned houses - seem to map with the falling Japanese population.

What you're hearing isn't accurate. Rents are going up in Tokyo, not down. Sure, there's a bunch of abandoned houses way out in remote rural areas, but no one wants to live there (for good reason). Housing prices do seem a lot more stable than in Anglosphere nations, however, and they're constantly building new housing (and knocking down old buildings to make way for them). Just like many other places, the population is concentrating in the big cities, so the population is generally rising there. However, unlike the US in particular, the Japanese yen has fallen a lot in value during the pandemic, and combined with recent inflation, this might have something to do with the recent rise in rents.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#288

Post by bufio »

danjac wrote: post #26

This is an interesting political trap for the ruling Conservatives that they have made for themselves. The traditional Conservative voter is a home-owner. So you might be a rabid socialist in your youth, but once you get a job, save up for a deposit, and buy your own home, you eventually transition to become yet another middle-aged Tory voter. That pipeline is now broken - young people are unable to save up for their…

The solution would have been to reduce population growth to a sustainable level more than a decade ago.

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#289

Post by bufio »

asdff wrote: post #212
nerdawson wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> current home owners - their ageing voting base - are NIMBYs who don't want the wrong sort of people living near them and any reduction in demand that would reduce their value of their homes New housing is directly against the interests of existing homeowners. Any plan that relies on people seriously disadvantaging themselves in order to benefit other people they don’t know is doomed to failure.

New housing means the area is worthy of investment. Homeowners should want that for their communities, it makes their homes more valuable than those in communities that developers pass over. Plus the more people living in an area, the more pressure on housing, the more your single family home would fetch compared to a less dense area. Ask yourself if as an investor you'd rather own a single family home in some New Je…

What investment?

Re: Why Britain doesn’t build

#290

Post by [deleted] »

majormajor wrote: post #225
spaceman_2020 wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Politicians and the bureaucratic class have deep investments in real estate 2. Foreign money keeps flooding into western economies to find a safe haven and lack of capital controls. A bulk of it goes into real estate. 3. Elections are largely monopolized by older people who mostly tend to be homeowners. The entire system is rigged against anything that would impact home prices - such as an increase in supply or ch…

The purpose of real estate development is to make real estate more valuable. So if you have laws restricting that development you need to look further than just "real-estate investors don't want development." Even ones not doing the development benefit financially - landlords love being able to raise the rents cause other people in the area built a bunch of new shit. The better off - and therefore more politically-co…

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