Why housing is so expensive - zoning rule are nuts

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Jaskalas

Lifer
Jun 23, 2004
33,382
7,445
136
You want us to find balance, we need to stop population growth.

So long as we continue to grow on finite land, all our resources will "remain" below "what is needed". Least for costs to remain within reason.
Sure, you can stack houses. You can shrink living space. And force people to have less housing per person. That's one resource we can make do with less, but the others? Farmland, water, logging, plastics? Good luck maintaining it all at ever increasing volume / demand. We are necessitating scarcity back into our lives. This won't be good for anyone.

Zoning laws may be nuts, but so is our obsession with becoming a bacteria that outgrows its petri dish.
 
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fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
You want us to find balance, we need to stop population growth.

So long as we continue to grow on finite land, all our resources will "remain" below "what is needed". Least for costs to remain within reason.
Sure, you can stack houses. You can shrink living space. And force people to have less housing per person. That's one resource we can make do with less, but the others? Farmland, water, logging, plastics? Good luck maintaining it all at ever increasing volume / demand. We are necessitating scarcity back into our lives. This won't be good for anyone.

Zoning laws may be nuts, but so is our obsession with becoming a bacteria that outgrows its petri dish.
People think France is a beautiful, idyllic place, right? What if we just become as dense as France.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
Really though, the issue is not population, it’s that housing construction is banned where it is most needed, in high productivity areas. You could hugely raise the standard of living for all Americans by simply allowing people to live where they can be most productive.
 
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Dec 10, 2005
23,990
6,793
136
You want us to find balance, we need to stop population growth.

So long as we continue to grow on finite land, all our resources will "remain" below "what is needed". Least for costs to remain within reason.
Sure, you can stack houses. You can shrink living space. And force people to have less housing per person. That's one resource we can make do with less, but the others? Farmland, water, logging, plastics? Good luck maintaining it all at ever increasing volume / demand. We are necessitating scarcity back into our lives. This won't be good for anyone.

Zoning laws may be nuts, but so is our obsession with becoming a bacteria that outgrows its petri dish.
Density means less sprawl. And people that live in denser communities use fewer resources per capita. So if things like energy, farmland, trash, etc concern you, density is a good thing.
 
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fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
Density means less sprawl. And people that live in denser communities use fewer resources per capita. So if things like energy, farmland, trash, etc concern you, density is a good thing.
Also, people with higher standards of living tend to have fewer kids so if your goal is population control additional density will raise living standards and reduce population growth.
 

MrSquished

Lifer
Jan 14, 2013
21,004
19,444
136
If you want to screw over all those Wall Street firms the best thing to do is build more housing. They freely admit the reason they are buying these properties is they expect new housing construction to remain drastically below what is needed.

It should be a great thing when evil entities admit what they want to happen and why they do things. Like CPAC wanting a 'pearl-harbor' type event to invade Iraq, before 9/11 happened. Here we have Wall Street straight up admitting how they are taking advantage of restrictive zoning to fuck over the middle and lower classes, and we got liberals marching to the drum of their beat just fine, trying to force one way of life on everyone else. And that is exactly what the most exploitative and greedy entities among us want to happen, exactly. Here they have 'super small' government conservatives loving big big government being dictators about land use, and you have liberals who say they want to accept all ways of life and help bring more equity to society, doing exactly the opposite.

Wall Street loves those people.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
Nobody is forcing density just loosening the forceful and restrictive rules that you want to force on everybody.

Even if you were at a house filled with mirrors you would never see yourself and understand how purposely misleading you are.
Yes, I know, you want to force the loosening of laws that were in place originally that made those localities the kind the people who bought there wanted to live in. Fuck those people. "I need to ruin the ambiance so I can move in and living that way is just fine by me." No thanks. I don’t want to have to see the faces of people like you when I look out the window. Don’t force me to live like you want to. Remember, locality, locality, locality. I didn't buy a house for a house. I bought a house and a locality the price of which I had to match to be able to move in. What you want to do is turn the peace and quiet of my little community into the constant wail of police sirens and frustrated rats blowing their horns.

Iike I said, you can't even get densely populated NYC people to build more housing.
 

Sunburn74

Diamond Member
Oct 5, 2009
5,025
2,593
136
Houses don't cost that much. Land where i live is what drives up costs. The basic issue is
1) many great cities actively prevent very dense housing/rentals with stupid regulatory laws
2) cities where you can buy a house, no one really wants to live there. Heck I would say 1/2 of the major US cities are totally unlivable to me, talk less small towns. I mean who wants to live in butthole sacramento or asswipe morgantown west virginia
3) cities do a poor job converting lousy businesses or even abandoned businesses that happen to take up a lot of space to highly dense housing or shelter for the homeless of etc.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
Yes, I know, you want to force the loosening of laws that were in place originally that made those localities the kind the people who bought there wanted to live in. Fuck those people. "I need to ruin the ambiance so I can move in and living that way is just fine by me." No thanks. I don’t want to have to see the faces of people like you when I look out the window. Don’t force me to live like you want to. Remember, locality, locality, locality. I didn't buy a house for a house. I bought a house and a locality the price of which I had to match to be able to move in. What you want to do is turn the peace and quiet of my little community into the constant wail of police sirens and frustrated rats blowing their horns.

Iike I said, you can't even get densely populated NYC people to build more housing.
I do love the unconscious authoritarianism here. I guess you are right that some people really are still asleep, you just don’t realize that person is you. Your argument is ‘by not allowing me to use the law to force people to live in housing I personally approve you are oppressing me’.

If you don’t want the land around you to be developed you are free to buy it and let it lie fallow.

It would be bad enough if you just stopped at using the government to seize control of land you don’t own but you don’t. Then you demand that the government subsidize you through special tax breaks to insulate you from the consequences of skyrocketing property costs!

So not only are you pushing for mass homelessness, you want the rest of us to pay you for it.
 
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brycejones

Lifer
Oct 18, 2005
25,992
23,792
136
You want us to find balance, we need to stop population growth.

So long as we continue to grow on finite land, all our resources will "remain" below "what is needed". Least for costs to remain within reason.
Sure, you can stack houses. You can shrink living space. And force people to have less housing per person. That's one resource we can make do with less, but the others? Farmland, water, logging, plastics? Good luck maintaining it all at ever increasing volume / demand. We are necessitating scarcity back into our lives. This won't be good for anyone.

Zoning laws may be nuts, but so is our obsession with becoming a bacteria that outgrows its petri dish.
You were wrong before and remain wrong. The US isn’t “full”.
 

[DHT]Osiris

Lifer
Dec 15, 2015
14,006
12,075
146
One source had that the US was short about 5 million homes. I think part of the problem is people want to live in areas that are already crowded. There needs to be more opportunities for smaller (<.5 million people) cities to grow.
I've been saying for years that companies need to start opening up new factories, datacenters, or other high density job locations in obscure towns. Give people a reason to NOT live in the top 20 cities in the US.
 
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fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
I've been saying for years that companies need to start opening up new factories, datacenters, or other high density job locations in obscure towns. Give people a reason to NOT live in the top 20 cities in the US.
We have been trying that for years, it’s why state and local governments give big tax breaks and other subsidies to companies opening locations in economically depressed areas.

The problem is kind of chicken or the egg though, companies can’t attract good workers in those locations so they don’t want to do it and people don’t want to move there because there aren’t job opportunities.
 

Pohemi

Diamond Member
Oct 2, 2004
8,613
10,862
146
The problem is kind of chicken or the egg though, companies can’t attract good workers in those locations so they don’t want to do it and people don’t want to move there because there aren’t job opportunities.
Plus, the additional time that it takes to develop better infrastructure so that people want to live there. Not just roads to handle increased traffic etc...but retail, restaurants, etc.

You can't just plop a factory down in a town of 10K people and expect the rest to take care of itself. They're considerable planning projects that are projected over a decade or longer most of the time. It obviously doesn't happen overnight, and the chance/risk of failure in the end, keeps the initial business from coming in to begin with.

Huge tax breaks can help add to the draw, but then it's punishing the communities/state by lowering the taxes on the corp so they aren't actually supporting the communities other than providing jobs to locals (if they don't bring their own people in.) Hell, sometimes the companies will take deals and then never hold up their end, and the state needs to sue the companies for not fulfilling their contracted obligations (see Foxconn in WI.)
 

MrSquished

Lifer
Jan 14, 2013
21,004
19,444
136
Plus, the additional time that it takes to develop better infrastructure so that people want to live there. Not just roads to handle increased traffic etc...but retail, restaurants, etc.

You can't just plop a factory down in a town of 10K people and expect the rest to take care of itself. They're considerable planning projects that are projected over a decade or longer most of the time. It obviously doesn't happen overnight, and the chance/risk of failure in the end, keeps the initial business from coming in to begin with.

Huge tax breaks can help add to the draw, but then it's punishing the communities/state by lowering the taxes on the corp so they aren't actually supporting the communities other than providing jobs to locals (if they don't bring their own people in.) Hell, sometimes the companies will take deals and then never hold up their end, and the state needs to sue the companies for not fulfilling their contracted obligations (see Foxconn in WI.)

Also the ship has sailed on American manufacturing for the forseeable future. I mean yes, some is and will come back, but it certainly won't be enough to seriously alter the current trajectories of small town America.
 
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Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
I do love the unconscious authoritarianism here. I guess you are right that some people really are still asleep, you just don’t realize that person is you. Your argument is ‘by not allowing me to use the law to force people to live in housing I personally approve you are oppressing me’.

If you don’t want the land around you to be developed you are free to buy it and let it lie fallow.

It would be bad enough if you just stopped at using the government to seize control of land you don’t own but you don’t. Then you demand that the government subsidize you through special tax breaks to insulate you from the consequences of skyrocketing property costs!

So not only are you pushing for mass homelessness, you want the rest of us to pay you for it.

I’m I asleep pointing out that what you want from me who lives nowhere close to you, you can’t get your own neighbors to accept. I express only my own opinion. I have done politically by way of voting only that which was never in my interest financially.

Sure, I am free to buy all the land around me and let it lie fallow, just as I am free to quit a job if I don’t like the pay or working condition, but God forbid if I unionize with my neighbors to preserve the nature of our neighborhood when the dead cells of the virus of competition wash up on my door steps. You are a proponent of a systemic cancer the logic of which is the imperative to spread, in infect, to consume everything tasty in your path and you feed yourself by being a part of that machine.

I chose to be a nobody because of the hollow emptiness of that path.

I demand nothing. I just tell you what I think of the system you inhabit, that instead of aiming for a garden of Eden and the true desire of the heart you aim is the functionality of an ant nest.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
You were wrong before and remain wrong. The US isn’t “full”.
We are talking about the storm front, the line of bacterial growth where fresh medium is being infected by the demand created by economic desperation, the timberline where the forest is being burnt to produce cattle and the indigenous useless are bulldozed under.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
We have been trying that for years, it’s why state and local governments give big tax breaks and other subsidies to companies opening locations in economically depressed areas.

The problem is kind of chicken or the egg though, companies can’t attract good workers in those locations so they don’t want to do it and people don’t want to move there because there aren’t job opportunities.

That a systemic result of the fact that society and development grow like a cancer rather than by a design based on a scientific understanding of human nature.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
Plus, the additional time that it takes to develop better infrastructure so that people want to live there. Not just roads to handle increased traffic etc...but retail, restaurants, etc.

You can't just plop a factory down in a town of 10K people and expect the rest to take care of itself. They're considerable planning projects that are projected over a decade or longer most of the time. It obviously doesn't happen overnight, and the chance/risk of failure in the end, keeps the initial business from coming in to begin with.

Huge tax breaks can help add to the draw, but then it's punishing the communities/state by lowering the taxes on the corp so they aren't actually supporting the communities other than providing jobs to locals (if they don't bring their own people in.) Hell, sometimes the companies will take deals and then never hold up their end, and the state needs to sue the companies for not fulfilling their contracted obligations (see Foxconn in WI.)

Yup, that is because the answers or failures to see answers are determined by the conditioning of the mind seeking them. A mind trapped in the Matrix seeks to preserve the comforts that delusion brings rather than a flush down the toilet of reality.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
I’m I asleep pointing out that what you want from me who lives nowhere close to you, you can’t get your own neighbors to accept. I express only my own opinion. I have done politically by way of voting only that which was never in my interest financially.

Sure, I am free to buy all the land around me and let it lie fallow, just as I am free to quit a job if I don’t like the pay or working condition, but God forbid if I unionize with my neighbors to preserve the nature of our neighborhood when the dead cells of the virus of competition wash up on my door steps. You are a proponent of a systemic cancer the logic of which is the imperative to spread, in infect, to consume everything tasty in your path and you feed yourself by being a part of that machine.

I chose to be a nobody because of the hollow emptiness of that path.

I demand nothing. I just tell you what I think of the system you inhabit, that instead of aiming for a garden of Eden and the true desire of the heart you aim is the functionality of an ant nest.
‘I demand nothing’

‘ok, so can I build an apartment building in your town?’

‘I demand you not do that’

lol.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
Also the ship has sailed on American manufacturing for the forseeable future. I mean yes, some is and will come back, but it certainly won't be enough to seriously alter the current trajectories of small town America.
o
AI will be coming for the jobs that remain. More and more homeless will be coming too. We may have to change the rules.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
‘I demand nothing’

‘ok, so can I build an apartment building in your town?’

‘I demand you not do that’

lol.
You wouldn’t be able to afford the land much less the building costs and my city has built a huge number of condominium, apartment complexes, and industrial office commercial buildings and is still building more but a few minutes drive will take an hour in at rush hour where it used to be only slightly more.

I suggest you head for higher ground. Sea level rise will soon make your desire worthless. I think the same can be said about NYC. Maybe the upper stories will be habitual by boat.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
You wouldn’t be able to afford the land much less the building costs and my city has built a huge number of condominium, apartment complexes, and industrial office commercial buildings and is still building more but a few minutes drive will take an hour in at rush hour where it used to be only slightly more.

I suggest you head for higher ground. Sea level rise will soon make your desire worthless. I think the same can be said about NYC. Maybe the upper stories will be habitual by boat.
Well since you aren’t demanding anything I will take that as you now agree with me. After all, the only thing I’m asking is for you to not use the power of government to demand people not build things. How fun!

And while I am not super rich if I can afford property in my neighborhood I’m confident I can afford property in yours as my neighborhood is one of the most expensive in the country. (Thanks, NIMBYS)

This is not and never has been about me though, my wife and I make a very nice living. It’s about all the people who don’t who you are making homeless out of selfishness. And again, the temerity to demand the government then subsidize you due to the consequences of your own actions is really next level. If you’re going to drive people into homelessness at least be willing to pay some extra taxes for the privilege.
 

fskimospy

Elite Member
Mar 10, 2006
83,717
47,406
136
Also a union is people pooling economic power. If you wanted to pool your resources with your neighbors to buy up all the land and leave it empty I have no problem with that either. It would be your land, after all, and my entire point is people should be able to use their land as they see fit, be it an apartment building, an empty field, an office where you demand additional government subsidy, whatever.

I just want you to stop making demands on land you don’t own.