the issue with housing is that other people hate other people. they don’t want more people living around them. they hate growth. they think people should live ‘somewhere else’ than their town/city/neighborhood.
i live in a city with over 120K people. if a housing project goes up that that adds say, 20 units for 30-40 people, people FREAK OUT. and oppose it and usually it gets downzied to like 12 units for 20 people, and only then it’s approved for development. this is in already very dense city, it’s worse in less dense places. anytime a major project, for like 500+ units is proposed, it has to be downsized by like 50% before anyone will approve it because the citizens REVOLT. they HATE new housing.
the last major development in my urban area added 8000 jobs, and 500 units of housing, and the major opposition was to the housing, all the feedback was ‘no new housing, but more new jobs’. the plan with the highest approval from the citizens was the one with 10,000 new jobs, and 0 new housing. and th eone with 5000 jobs and 1000 units of housing, was opposed like 90%. and the plan that was approved only had a 1 vote margin…
this is what people want. they democratically oppose new housing at every opportunity.
I look at the problem first and then the second order effects. Otherwise you end up constrained by what other people think. People are irrational and the question is.
As a citizen what do I think property ownership in america should look like and where should the incentives be.
If you can get people to engage with that idea. Then they can think for themselves and there’s less room for people to put ideas in their head.
the issue with housing is that other people hate other people. they don’t want more people living around them. they hate growth. they think people should live ‘somewhere else’ than their town/city/neighborhood.
i live in a city with over 120K people. if a housing project goes up that that adds say, 20 units for 30-40 people, people FREAK OUT. and oppose it and usually it gets downzied to like 12 units for 20 people, and only then it’s approved for development. this is in already very dense city, it’s worse in less dense places. anytime a major project, for like 500+ units is proposed, it has to be downsized by like 50% before anyone will approve it because the citizens REVOLT. they HATE new housing.
the last major development in my urban area added 8000 jobs, and 500 units of housing, and the major opposition was to the housing, all the feedback was ‘no new housing, but more new jobs’. the plan with the highest approval from the citizens was the one with 10,000 new jobs, and 0 new housing. and th eone with 5000 jobs and 1000 units of housing, was opposed like 90%. and the plan that was approved only had a 1 vote margin…
this is what people want. they democratically oppose new housing at every opportunity.
More people = more competition for resources.
More housing ≠ more people. We aren’t going back to a 3+ child average unless a lot of other things change
I look at the problem first and then the second order effects. Otherwise you end up constrained by what other people think. People are irrational and the question is.
As a citizen what do I think property ownership in america should look like and where should the incentives be.
If you can get people to engage with that idea. Then they can think for themselves and there’s less room for people to put ideas in their head.