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Comment by manfredo | Hacker News Reader

"We'll do anything to solve the housing crisis!"

"How about building more housing?"

"Anything but that!"

People currently living there don't see it as a "housing crisis". They see it as "too many people coming here, trying to change our single family house peaceful residential neighborhood into bigger buildings".

So "how about limiting influx of new people / new development?"

"Sure, let's do that"

I understand newcomers may disagree with that approach, out of understandable self interest.

But implying people currently living there are clueless or more selfish by defending their interests?? Trying to make newcomers sound morally superior? Come on.... You can do better that than that.

So their plan to solve the housing crises essentially involves trying to keep new people out of the SF Bay area? Keep in mind that this is an area that heavily prides itself on being diverse and inclusive.

People aren't clueless for defending their interests, but they absolutely are being highly deceptive in the way they are going about it. Many even go so far as to try and claim that increasing housing supply will actually increase prices. There was even a ballot initiative to ban market rate housing construction in central San Francisco.

Again, from the people living there, what's the housing crisis?? Yes, they are trying to limit how many people are coming in, that's obvious. This is different from inclusive and diversity issues. This is about 100 new diverse people rather than 1,000.

Again you can disagree with them, it is fair, but I think their approach is perfectly understandable, and if you want to argue and debate, no one should assume they are hypocritical or morally inferior. I read thosr comments all the time on HN.

The minute you say "housing crisis", you show which situation/point of view you're coming from. It's not a crisis that "needs" to be solved with more housing, it is just your viewpoint.

It's not an assumption of hypocrisy. It genuinely is hypocrisy. A group of people are praising themselves for their inclusivity, while pushing for exclusionary policies. If they want to pursue these policies without being hypocritical then they need to change their messaging to be transparent about their desire for exclusion rather than inclusion.

Are you saying that unless one welcomes an infinity of people in their backyard, one cannot be inclusive?

I think you should explain and defend the policy you wish, instead of critizing an imaginary adversary by putting words in their mouth.

If you want more housing, hoping that prices will go down, say so. If you favor a SF Bay area looking progressively more like NY City, say so. Many people are very happy in NYC. And prices are also very high there.

Just expect some people to frankly disagree with that proposed evolution, and don't attack them by being non inclusive: this is not the question. Misrepresenting their arguments is not helping further your point of view.

(whose incumbent said "we will do anything to solve the housing crisis?" in your original point?)

I'm saying that if one supports policies with the intended effect of excluding people from moving into one's neighborhood, it's hypocrisy to call oneself inclusive.

> If you want more housing, hoping that prices will go down, say so. If you favor a SF Bay area looking progressively more like NY City, say so. Many people are very happy in NYC.

Yes, absolutely. Build more housing and build denser housing. This is what pro-housing people have been saying for years.

> And prices are also very high there.

There's 8 million people in NYC instead of 800,000 in San Francisco.

> Just expect some people to frankly disagree with that proposed evolution, and don't attack them by being non inclusive: this is not the question. Misrepresenting their arguments is not helping further your point of view.

Pointing out the contradiction of one's purported values with their actions is not an attack. When people support exclusory policies like rent control and curbing housing development with the goal of reducing the ability of people to move there, they are being exclusive. This is not a misrepresentation. People who support said policies while simultaneously purporting to foster an inclusive community are indeed being hypocritical. This is not an attack, this is a factually correct observation.

> Are you saying that unless one welcomes an infinity of people in their backyard, one cannot be inclusive?

San Francisco is a sanctuary city so officially they do encourage more newcomers to come.

> Again, from the people living there, what's the housing crisis??

Well, their children can't afford to live here so that's going to be a problem.

> But implying people currently living there are clueless or more selfish by defending their interests?

Somebody defending their interests doesn't make them not selfish.

True. But it does not make them "more" selfish because they just disagree with one's just as selfish opinion. (My point) Let's stop calling people names, and all argue what evolution we want, and possibly respectfully disagree.

The thing that I will never understand is that the incumbents with this attitude are still hurting themselves with these policies. Even if they own a home and are protected by Prop 13 from large property tax increases, they still have to contend with all the rest of the problems that the housing crisis brings. Perhaps the fear of change overrides common sense, but I find it hard to believe that, rationally, the neighborhood "changing in character", or home values dipping the slightest bit, would be worse than the other negative realities that NIMBYs still experience here.

I think a lot of it boils down to an ingrained belief that real estate should be an investment. Everyone buys a house with the expectation that its value will go up. This means that homeowners are extremely adverse to policies that might reduce home prices (like building more housing).

Contrast this with houses in Japan, where it's expected that a home is a depreciating asset. Houses in the Special Wards of Tokyo can be bought for $300-400k: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGbC5j4pG9w

That's a very good point. I'm of the opinion that a primary residence is a liability, not an investment, but it's true that I'm in the minority when it comes to the US.

This can go for just about any social problem.

"We have to do something about X!"

"Here's what sacrifices you can make to help..."

"Oh, I meant we need to help, not me."

I'm totally fine with apartment buildings going up next door. That was literally the case 2 months ago. I was happy to see more housing stock being added.

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