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Comment by xyzzy123 | Hacker News Reader

IMHO an under-appreciated side effect of rising property values is the destruction of third places (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place), a role that pubs often filled in the UK. As land values rise the pressure to make a return on any given space goes up. Leads to fewer places to "hang out" without strong pressure to spend money.

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Damn. Working from home I don't even have a second place.

And with skyrocketing rents and house prices, hanging on that first place presents a challenge.

Land value tax would solve this.

Perhaps in the very long term. But drastically increasing taxes on property would certainly not improve things for home owners who'd still have to keep paying their mortgage as well. And even renters would likely find their landlord passing on much of the taxes...

The solution for low-income groups we want to protect (like retirees in their primary home) is generally to defer the tax until their home is sold. And ideally it would reduce their cost of living for other reasons, since land value near them would be deflated and properties would be improved so there's more workers in the area, there's less reliance on other regressive taxes like sales tax, etc.

You don't want to protect groups like that, as it means that they tie up valuable properties in economic centres and workers can't afford to live there. The failures of rent control in Sweden for example, are a great example of this.

Tax wealth, not work. Income tax should be near zero (especially <$100k), and instead tax property with land value tax, property tax, inheritance tax, etc. so that people can work their way up.

The main reason you want to do that is they're the average voter. Young people don't vote. They also might not have a community/family/friends anymore and might not be capable of relocating.

LVT is a better-designed alternative to property tax; taxing property (improvements to land) has the downside that you want people to improve their land, and taxing that would cause deadweight loss.

Homeownership cannot be saved. Do LVT and maybe bsil out people with underwater mortgages with a debt rightoff, but do not preserve SFH ownership.

Don’t know why you think giving the government even more money is gonna solve anything.

You're lazily strawmanning and failing to offer an alternative to a constructive suggestion.

This comment has negative value.

Taxation doesn’t give the government money; the government is the source of money and can create more if it wants to. Taxation destroys money, which is good if you think there’s too much of it.

(Some exceptions to this model due to federalism, since state and local governments don’t get to create money except by issuing bonds and getting federal funds for unwise construction projects.)

This is my biggest complaint with the remote revolution right now. I don’t get out of my house anymore during the week and it makes me sort of stir crazy by the weekend.

Wouldn't it be more aptly described as a conflict between the relative rate of increase in (urban) property value vs wages ? Arguably entirely a function of monetary policy for the past decade plus.

[0] https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2021/05/how-uk-house-p...

Going to church or other religious assembly seems like your only option, doesn't work for me though.

Ever considered becoming a furry instead?

As a way to destroy property values, sure, all the time

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