On Mon, 21 Jan 2002, Nick Arnett wrote: > > Behalf Of Dan Minette > > 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? > > Too much money -- at the high end of the income range -- chasing too few > houses. It's not that there isn't enough space. Not even that there isn't > enough housing. I'm not sure what the statistics are, exactly, but we have > a very high percentage of renters here relative to the rest of the country. > The market has been driven up by a relatively small part of the population, > with a lot of money, competing for the existing housing. At the upper end > of housing prices, it has been really ridiculous, with people paying $5 > million for houses with asking prices of $4 million, for example.
I have a hard time figuring out how to look at things like this. Similar problems (thought on a smaller scale, I suspect) are happening in Austin. On the one hand, it's tempting to blame the damage done to the poor (not being able to afford to live near their jobs, not being able to afford health or child care, etc.) on shortsighted public policy and to imagine that the solution is more progressive social programs. On the other hand, it's also tempting to blame the damage done on the sheer greed and lifestyle lust of the hyperambitious and newly-rich. If dot-com boomers are spending all their money on real estate and social ambition without taking time plan for balanced communities, then it would be what they deserve for the policemen, firemen, teachers, & service-industry workers to collectively say "f*ck you" and move to Madison, WI. Unfortunately, it usually takes resources to relocate, and teachers and firefighters and policemen are far more loyal to their jobs than dotcommers. There's a weird kind of Hegelian master-slave paradigm at work. The Masters suddenly wake up and realize they're on the verge of losing the servant classes upon whom they depend, and suddenly become "altruistic." That altruism rarely pays well, though, because there are always enough people who believe that the unions who lobby for better benefits and pay for teachers and police and firefighters must be thwarted at all costs.... Marvin Long Austin, Texas
