----- Original Message ----- From: "Nick Arnett" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Brin-L" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, January 21, 2002 11:49 AM Subject: RE: Gummint programs and stats (was RE: Presidents RE: Corruption ...) > > You clearly understand how painful it is, yet still call for others to do > it.
Sure, because that's reality. Lotsa people want to live in the Bay Area, more than the locality can support. I checked with real estate web sites, and saw the only listing under 500k as a 499k 600 sq. foot house. In Houston, 1300 sq. ft. house on sale for 900k in a quick serarch. Down here, a new 2000 sq. ft. house goes for about 100k on average. That's absolutely crazy. Lets assume that a teacher could get a 1500 sq. foot house for 750k. That would mean payments of about 50,000 per year with a 30 year mortgage. They would have to make over 200,000 per year to qualify. The solution is killing the crazy house prices. Building new homes could help. But, I cannot imagine a public policy to drive down house prices would be accepted by the residents who have their life savings in the housing market. The only real choice is to let the market do it...by people moving away from those crazy prices. Trust me, I've lived through two real estate depressions: when buyers go away, prices fall like a rock. > > I thought it was self-evident that we need teachers, dry cleaners, police, > firefighters, etc., here. If they all leave, we're in big trouble. Right, so what would happen, if teachers decided to take better deals elsewhere? I know that there is a shortage of teachers here, and jobs are now available. Now, with teachers, its possible that the school district would accept larger classes and poorer education. My California friends tell my how bad the schools are there...I never thought that Texas schools would sound better but they do. Then, there would be a good reason to push for higher teacher salaries. If dry cleaners shut down, and the remaining ones have more business than they can stand, won't they be able to raise prices? Police and firefighters might be different, but if no one fills job openings, then one would hope the public will be responsible enough to raise salaries. But even so, I can't see how that will adress what I see as the fundamental problem. > I have started companies here. And to survive, they have to be >competitive, which means paying people roughly what the competition does. The problem >is structural, which fundamentally cannot be solved by individual companies. > That is why Joint Valley Silicon Valley exists. Right, but how can it work, when the fundamental stuructural problem appears to be too many people competing for too few places to live? 900 dollars per square foot is just ridiculous. Around here its about $50/sq. foot. There is no way to construct an ecconomy where everyone can afford that. And if you could, then prices would go higher, becasue demand would still exceed all possible supply. > > That does not improve things for people who whose jobs are essential to >the local community. But, with fewer people, fewer workers are needed there. They can follow you to west of Madison, where they can live a good life. > We disagree deeply. I don't believe it is right to call for people to >leave a community that has problems. Even if the main problem is a lack of living space? If that isn't the reason, why are housing prices in your area so ridiculously high? If you do raise the income of firefighters and police so they can put offers in on those 750k homes in your area, won't that raise the price of homes still further, since more people will be bidding on the same small number of homes? I'll stop there and adress other points seperately. In short, I think the central structural problem is that there cannot possibly be affordable housing in your area without driving down the price of real estate. Dan M.
