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Lyesh posted:Eradicating World poverty is probably outside the US's power, but we could be trying literally thousands of times harder than we are to do so. Seven trillion dollars per year or whatever could pay for a whole lot of third-world infrastructure and feed a loving LOT of starving people. What the-- someone should tell the President we figured out how to solve poverty!
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Oct 17, 2014 20:05
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Enigma89 posted:Different cities do it differently. In that wall of text I posted above I gave a couple of examples. Who in the middle class is trying to buy an apartment building as an investment? Or do you mean a business? Even then, who are these people and how on Earth can they afford it?
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Oct 17, 2014 20:09
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mugrim posted:Who in the middle class is trying to buy an apartment building as an investment? Or do you mean a business? Even then, who are these people and how on Earth can they afford it? I think he means a single apartment.
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Oct 17, 2014 20:17
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Lyesh posted:Eradicating World poverty is probably outside the US's power, but we could be trying literally thousands of times harder than we are to do so. Seven trillion dollars per year or whatever could pay for a whole lot of third-world infrastructure and feed a loving LOT of starving people. Still a lot of people though.
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Oct 17, 2014 20:22
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Popular Thug Drink posted:I think he means a single apartment. That would make less sense as investing in a single unit is already a crazy risk for anyone who cant afford to just lose money on a dare. If youre middle class, affording your own shelter is already a crazy chunk of income.
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Oct 17, 2014 20:38
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Lyesh posted:Eradicating World poverty is probably outside the US's power, but we could be trying literally thousands of times harder than we are to do so. Seven trillion dollars per year or whatever could pay for a whole lot of third-world infrastructure and feed a loving LOT of starving people. Well I definitely agree we should be doing more to address poverty, I just think povery is mostly not about lack of money (as weird as that looks when it's typed out). Social and health factors play a bigger role in homelessness than lack of money. In developing countries, governance problems, violence, and social divisions are bigger problems. Merely building a bridge won't help that much if it's built with foreign labour and if there's no local capacity (or will) to maintain it.
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Oct 17, 2014 20:39
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Lyesh posted:Eradicating World poverty is probably outside the US's power, but we could be trying literally thousands of times harder than we are to do so. Seven trillion dollars per year or whatever could pay for a whole lot of third-world infrastructure and feed a loving LOT of starving people. That 7 trillion or so is flowing through the world economy supporting jobs and infrastructure and etc already, is the thing. And in part it constitutes the return of working capital without which companies wouldn't be able to operate. Messing with that too much would create a lot more starving people than you could feed. wateroverfire fucked around with this message at 21:07 on Oct 17, 2014 |
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Oct 17, 2014 20:55
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Rent control is believing that the solution to lack of housing is to make it less profitable to construct housing. Shockingly, it doesn't work. The best argument for it is displayed right here in this thread, as the only argument for it: "uh, if you don't truly BELIEVE then you are basically, like, Reagan, man."
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Oct 17, 2014 21:06
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Rent control is not supposed to help anyone get an apartment. Rent control is not supposed to increase the housing supply. Rent control is not supposed to solve demand. It does the opposite of those things because it is intended to do the opposite of those things. Rent control is not economic policy, stop projecting your wants onto it.
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Oct 17, 2014 21:18
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tbp posted:What the-- someone should tell the President we figured out how to solve poverty! The politicians across the U.S. are fully aware that they could fund universal public healthcare, education, housing and transportation via proper progressive taxation on both income and capital gains. They simply don't want to, and never will. It's a moot point.
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Oct 17, 2014 21:27
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Talmonis posted:The politicians across the U.S. are fully aware that they could fund universal public healthcare, education, housing and transportation via proper progressive taxation on both income and capital gains. Yeah but there's a difference between ideas like just giving third world countries trillions of dollars, or rent control, and ideas like universal public healthcare, education, and housing, being that the first group of ideas are bad and the second are good. Like I said earlier, I don't get why leftists insist that there's actually no difference, because none of them will get implemented so it doesn't matter anyways. That kind of vocal, petulant defeatism gets incredibly obnoxious at a certain point. If you really don't care then shut up and go home, you don't have to make sure everyone knows you feel that way and shut down all discussion otherwise.
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Oct 17, 2014 21:46
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say no to scurvy posted:Rent control is not supposed to help anyone get an apartment. Rent control is not supposed to increase the housing supply. Rent control is not supposed to solve demand. It does the opposite of those things because it is intended to do the opposite of those things. Rent control is not economic policy, stop projecting your wants onto it. One of the main goals of rent control is supposed to increase the supply of affordable housing, and attempts to do so by lowering rent below market rates. Whether or not it is able to accomplish this is very relevant to local policy, and is literally the thread topic and the subject of the OP
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Oct 17, 2014 21:49
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say no to scurvy posted:Rent control is not supposed to help anyone get an apartment. Rent control is not supposed to increase the housing supply. Rent control is not supposed to solve demand. It does the opposite of those things because it is intended to do the opposite of those things. Oh okay, it sounds like a very good idea then.
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Oct 17, 2014 21:51
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I don't really see what's wrong with a simple public subsidy of rent, IE if you can't pay the market rate the government will make up the difference.
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Oct 17, 2014 21:51
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icantfindaname posted:I don't really see what's wrong with a simple public subsidy of rent, IE if you can't pay the market rate the government will make up the difference. Apart from creating a 100% marginal tax rate?
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Oct 17, 2014 21:56
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Soviet Space Dog posted:Apart from creating a 100% marginal tax rate? What? How would a subsidy create a 100% tax rate?
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Oct 17, 2014 22:00
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icantfindaname posted:I don't really see what's wrong with a simple public subsidy of rent, IE if you can't pay the market rate the government will make up the difference. Pretty sure this is how we do it in Canada. I think in practice it's an enormously complex, dehumanizing system that can only be navigated with the help of a case worker, like most of our welfare programs. But at least it's a good idea in theory, unlike rent control.
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Oct 17, 2014 22:09
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Talmonis posted:The politicians across the U.S. are fully aware that they could fund universal public healthcare, education, housing and transportation via proper progressive taxation on both income and capital gains. Housing and transportation are both gigantic messy projects (even if you're only talking about a city level) that would displace large numbers of people and make a lot of people very angry and I don't fault any politician that wants to avoid hitting that wasp's nest.
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Oct 17, 2014 22:14
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icantfindaname posted:I don't really see what's wrong with a simple public subsidy of rent, IE if you can't pay the market rate the government will make up the difference. A simple subsidy would push rents up over time because the market rate is partly determined by what people can afford. You'd have a subsidy allowing more people to compete for the same housing, which would allow landlords to demand higher rent, which would raise the market rate, which would raise the subsidy, and repeat. Trying to monkey with the market that way is probably going to be less effective than for instance building a bunch of units and designating them affordable. Or clearing the way for high-density developments so supply exists to accommodate lower income tenants.
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Oct 17, 2014 23:09
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If you read that fantastic Chicago blog from a few pages back, you can see pretty clearly that the best way to get 'affordable' housing is to change zoning restrictions, whether it be in the near-downtown or the suburbs (or realistically, both).
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Oct 17, 2014 23:35
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So what's different about Germany that makes rent control work quite well there?
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Oct 17, 2014 23:56
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icantfindaname posted:Yeah but there's a difference between ideas like just giving third world countries trillions of dollars, or rent control, and ideas like universal public healthcare, education, and housing, being that the first group of ideas are bad and the second are good. Like I said earlier, I don't get why leftists insist that there's actually no difference, because none of them will get implemented so it doesn't matter anyways. That kind of vocal, petulant defeatism gets incredibly obnoxious at a certain point. If you really don't care then shut up and go home, you don't have to make sure everyone knows you feel that way and shut down all discussion otherwise. You know most leftists are fine with universal public healthcare, education and housing and don't say we need to give the third world trillions to do it. You are confusing third world maoists with every other leftism known to man.
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Oct 17, 2014 23:58
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OwlBot 2000 posted:So what's different about Germany that makes rent control work quite well there?
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Oct 17, 2014 23:59
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OwlBot 2000 posted:So what's different about Germany that makes rent control work quite well there? What makes you think it's working well in Germany? edit to sound less snarky: Germany's had a very strong economy for the last couple decades, mostly fueled by some pretty unfair exploitation of its neighbours in the eurozone. Booming economies can have lots of economically "inefficient" policies and get away with them while the good times last. See: all the stupid poo poo that oil-rich countries spend money on. The US has had massive agricultural subsidies in place for decades, but not many academics would say that's good policy. So since I don't know much about Germany it's hard to judge their policies in a vacuum. Guy DeBorgore fucked around with this message at 00:10 on Oct 18, 2014 |
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Oct 17, 2014 23:59
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mastershakeman posted:If you read that fantastic Chicago blog from a few pages back, you can see pretty clearly that the best way to get 'affordable' housing is to change zoning restrictions, whether it be in the near-downtown or the suburbs (or realistically, both). Sure, but changing zoning restrictions means public comment and hearings, giving the NIMBYs an opportunity to organize and shut that poo poo down. It's a totally viable technique IF there is the political will to do so, and that political will can dissipate quickly if a bunch of wealthy neighborhood homeowners get together and complain about their property values and apply pressure to the zoning board. Changing zoning is a carrot approach, but you still need a stick to make developers cater directly to the people in need and not just build middle of the road decent apartments, which would only help the poor by lessening housing pressure as the middle classes move into the new units. icantfindaname posted:I don't really see what's wrong with a simple public subsidy of rent, IE if you can't pay the market rate the government will make up the difference. We do that in America with Section 8 vouchers. It works in theory, but in practice there is a stigma associated with Section 8 tenants meaning that most landlords refuse to accept the vouchers, creating a sort of slumlord effect as landlords with awful properties accept the vouchers to rent at higher than market rate for substandard residences. Again, this is because most low-income housing is just hand-me-down falling apart rat traps that nobody else wants to live in, because nobody builds new housing for the lower or lower middle class. boner confessor fucked around with this message at 00:08 on Oct 18, 2014 |
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Oct 18, 2014 00:02
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Germany's home prices are like California home prices, everywhere. That's not something to aspire to.
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Oct 18, 2014 00:31
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Popular Thug Drink posted:Again, this is because most low-income housing is just hand-me-down falling apart rat traps that nobody else wants to live in, because nobody builds new housing for the lower or lower middle class. There's an interesting book that touches on this that I just read - Brown in the Windy City by Lilia Fernández. In it, she describes how Mexicans & Puerto Ricans moved into Chicago during the 1950s and 1960s, and how a lot of the apartments they moved into were built up to 100 years ago. Not only that, but the migrants were being charged rents comparable to what others (read: whites) in nicer neighborhoods paid.
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Oct 18, 2014 00:40
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mugrim posted:Who in the middle class is trying to buy an apartment building as an investment? Or do you mean a business? Even then, who are these people and how on Earth can they afford it? The clever ones are. The others are putting are investing in...? I don't even know what is actually a profitable investment anymore for the middle class. You buy a 4-plex as an owner-user with a low interest loan (FHA). You use the tenants to pay off your mortgage and you live in one of the units for free. You can even move out because as far as I can tell in my experience no one ever really checks if you live there.  I know several people who have done this and they have basically used the government to subsidize their initial real estate investment. There is real no need to buy an actual 'home' with your FHA loan. You are allowed to by a multi-unit project.Also to sweeten the deal you are allowed (in California) to sell the building and if you do an 'exchange' within 30 days of the sale you can take the money you got from your recent sale and put it into a bigger project tax free. Enigma89 fucked around with this message at 01:10 on Oct 18, 2014 |
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Oct 18, 2014 00:59
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Enigma89 posted:The clever ones are. The others are putting are investing in...? I don't even know what is actually a profitable investment anymore for the middle class. I think we may just have vastly different ideas of middle class.
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Oct 18, 2014 02:37
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Enigma89 posted:The clever ones are. The others are putting are investing in...? I don't even know what is actually a profitable investment anymore for the middle class. The middle class (if you're actually talking about it in terms of "people who have the median amount of wealth" can't afford to make significant investments of this nature. I'm pretty sure my family is above the 50th percentile, and there's no way in hell we could ever afford to buy another condo/home as an investment.
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Oct 18, 2014 02:45
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The requirements to get a fourplex loan are not very upper class at allquote:Basic FHA loan requirements. On top of that, the FHA will finance up to 96.5% of the cost. It's a risky financial venture, but certainly not out of reach, and bankruptcy shields you from the downside.
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Oct 18, 2014 04:04
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mugrim posted:Who in the middle class is trying to buy an apartment building as an investment? Or do you mean a business? Even then, who are these people and how on Earth can they afford it? Most smaller buildings (2-4 units) aren't much more expensive than a single family house, and the rent from the unit(s) you don't live offsets most/all of your monthly P&I payment. If a member of the middle class can afford a nice single family house, they can typically afford a 2-4 unit apartment building, if they can live in the smaller space and deal with living next to the tenants. Example from SE DC: $270k buys a building with 2x3bd apartments, which rent for ~$1400 (not rent controlled due to the size of the building). It's not as nice as a house, but with most houses in that section of the city going for $200k or so, it's about as affordable. Now, that's a pretty bad area of the city, in a nicer area, the prices rise significantly but the rents don't. With the rent from the other unit (calling it $1300, since there will be some vacancy), someone putting 5% down on an FHA mortgage would end up paying ~$400/mo in mortgage/taxes/insurance plus maintenance for both units. Cheaper than renting, if you can come up with the 5% down. Popular Thug Drink posted:We do that in America with Section 8 vouchers. It works in theory, but in practice there is a stigma associated with Section 8 tenants meaning that most landlords refuse to accept the vouchers, creating a sort of slumlord effect as landlords with awful properties accept the vouchers to rent at higher than market rate for substandard residences. Again, this is because most low-income housing is just hand-me-down falling apart rat traps that nobody else wants to live in, because nobody builds new housing for the lower or lower middle class. In most areas with rent control, landlords have to accept S8 vouchers (DC, SF, and NYC, at least). The vouchers are always kinda weird; sometimes they're so far under market that no sane landlord would consider taking them, sometimes they're so high above it that landlords pack buildings full of S8 tenants. This brings up another question re: rent control. Every rent controlled building I've been inside has been in the absolutely shittiest shape that could stand a chance of passing inspection (and a few significantly worse). How do we create an incentive for an owner to do more than the bare minimum with rent control in place? Ytlaya posted:The middle class (if you're actually talking about it in terms of "people who have the median amount of wealth" can't afford to make significant investments of this nature. I'm pretty sure my family is above the 50th percentile, and there's no way in hell we could ever afford to buy another condo/home as an investment. He's talking about living in the building, not buying it strictly as an investment. If you can afford a house (a big if, at 50th percentile), you can usually afford a 2-unit building.
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Oct 18, 2014 04:04
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OwlBot 2000 posted:So what's different about Germany that makes rent control work quite well there? Germany's population (and that of its major cities) has been flatlining for decades whereas places like London and SF have seen strong population growth over the last 20-30 years that hasn't been matched by an increase in the supply of housing. Basically, Germany's system 'works' because it's never come under meaningful pressure. Here are charts showing the changes in the populations of Berlin, London, and San Francisco over the last two or three decades - can you spot the odd one out?    on the left posted:The requirements to get a fourplex loan are not very upper class at all...
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Oct 18, 2014 09:22
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Ytlaya posted:The middle class (if you're actually talking about it in terms of "people who have the median amount of wealth" Hmmm, the term really means "somewhere between working class and upper class". The median average person would be working class, and a neurosurgeon would be middle class. (The definition has become a bit hazy over the years.)
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Oct 18, 2014 15:17
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Lisbon's rent control is pretty awesome and long time residents pay like 30 euros a month for rent in a hot area. It also gives the city a distressed and authentically shabby look. A win-win in my book. Rent controls aren't an economic policy but a political one designed to reward incumbent renters at the expense of new residents coming in.
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Oct 18, 2014 15:35
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LemonDrizzle posted:Does that gross income include the expected income from renting out the other units in the four-plex or is it just income at the time of making the mortgage application that's considered? If they're currently occupied, you can count 75% of the rent income IIRC.
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Oct 18, 2014 17:06
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Peven Stan posted:Lisbon's rent control is pretty awesome and long time residents pay like 30 euros a month for rent in a hot area. It also gives the city a distressed and authentically shabby look. A win-win in my book. Rent controls aren't an economic policy but a political one designed to reward incumbent renters at the expense of new residents coming in. I am very doubtful about legislating to help fix people geographically in place, if that is the effect. That seems like the recipe for economic death spirals where people are in locations where there aren't any jobs or investment, but can't leave because they risk losing their rent benefits. I am not in principle opposed to the idea of rent control, but I think it is also foolish to reject the reservations of the vast majority of economists as 'neoliberal bias'. I suspect it is much more effective for the state to just build houses than futz around with price controls.
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Oct 18, 2014 17:14
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Fangz posted:I am very doubtful about legislating to help fix people geographically in place, if that is the effect. That seems like the recipe for economic death spirals where people are in locations where there aren't any jobs or investment, but can't leave because they risk losing their rent benefits. Fortunately for politicians (and unfortunate for the aspergers ridden economics discipline) rent is only one factor in why people move to or away from a particular city. Almost like real life is not full of frictionless surfaces????
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Oct 18, 2014 17:22
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People living in the wealthiest cities for the longest time should rightfully be given preferential treatment and abnormally cheap rent instead of outsiders from economically depressed areas, this is a good and equitable use of government power that leftists can get behind.
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Oct 18, 2014 17:30
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Peven Stan posted:Fortunately for politicians (and unfortunate for the aspergers ridden economics discipline) rent is only one factor in why people move to or away from a particular city. Almost like real life is not full of frictionless surfaces???? .... Is it truly necessary to look at things in black and white terms? I am not in fact saying that it is impossible for people to leave. I am however saying that the idea has a negative consequence in that it makes it more difficult for poor people to move in search of work and opportunities, and that I find it difficult to see why societies should favour people who don't travel over people who do. Thanks for the strawman and autism shaming?
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Oct 18, 2014 17:31
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