Housing is not a free market because its supply is artificially restricted by zoning regulations meant to protect the value of current homeowners' properties.
Technically this is supply and demand at play that pushes the prices into fantasy land. Which means after years you will have locals thrown out of their flats because the prices have risen so drastically that only few landlords will take their tenants side.
Markets don’t value social stabilty and don’t give a damn about who lived there for how many generations and what they did for that place.
Is the rage of the displaced morally justified? Can a system that produces such results be desireable for a society as a whole?
It's probably not that direct. Sure, you could build up and achieve the population density of Hong Kong, but then SF would lose the "little big city" charm that makes it a great place to be.
And as we see in Hong Kong, simply adding housing units doesn't necessarily reduce the price of housing.
So I'd argue the primary purpose of the zoning regs is to retain what makes SF what it is, not just to maximize price per square foot.
Do you have more info on that? I'd be particularly curious if the per capta price of housing increased with population at the same rate as places like SF.
So, you're argueing that you'll be fine living near a major hog farm in the middle of a city or a couple of major brothels (which are legal in a lot of places around the world)?
Parent made argument that zoning is the whole problem, is bad and entrenches home owners.
I provided two - albeit extreme - examples, why zoning is important.
Methinks that the consequences of the libertarian arguments of DAMN REGULATION! are quite often rather badly thought through. And that's what I wanted to point out.
Don't want to live near a tannery? Then you probably should be careful, when arguing for the abolishment of zoning and building regulations.
> Parent made argument that zoning is the whole problem
Did I though? Or that did I made the argument that some of the zoning regulations contribute to the problem of housing markets being inefficient (which is a subset of the whole affordable housing problem)?
I can argue for more apartment blocks to be built without necessarily arguing for less regulations on the locations of brothers and hog farms.