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Comment by AnthonyMouse | Hacker News Reader

> I wonder, if you count agents in a market economy as having not just money to spend making rational purchases, but also political power as a sort of alternate currency (represented by a vote each), is NIMBY really a rational market reaction.

The problem comes when you realize what you have to do to get a vote, which is to buy a house. If you can't afford to live there then you can't vote for policies that will reduce housing costs there because you aren't a resident. And once you have a vote because you own a house, now you want housing prices to go up rather than down.

There is no way for the people who need less expensive housing to vote for it, and the opposite incentive for the people who could vote for it to actually do that.

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I was more just thinking about how political actions/will/impacts can be simulated as a second resource in an economy much like how we simulate money. Think simulation/exploration/explanation of the idea, not recommendation.

I've developer a few simplistic economic simulations in the past for fun, some of which included land ownership, but I never considered adding each agent having the ability to modify the law of land ownership as part of the simulation. The comment made me think of what would the impact of adding it be, and if there is less validity of models which don't include it.

Renters can and should vote.

I think this is one reason why smallish homeowners are not comfortable with developers bringing in lots of high density housing (at whatever price). They feel pretty well aligned with their neighbors and don't want the balance of power to shift. Maybe a proportional representation system at the council level could help defuse tensions in some markets.

> The problem comes when you realize what you have to do to get a vote, which is to buy a house.

The franchise isn't restricted to homeowners; renters too can vote.

> The franchise isn't restricted to homeowners; renters too can vote.

Only if they can afford to pay the rent there. Which is difficult in an area zoned almost entirely for single family homes, because hardly anybody can afford to rent an entire house but not afford to actually buy it.

Especially because we have a whole collection of policies to encourage people to buy rather than rent, which causes disproportionately many of the people who can afford to live in areas with high housing costs to be owners rather than renters and therefore vote for policies that keep prices high.

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