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Comment by burnt-resistor | Hacker News Reader

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I have a soft spot for anyone with a background in Turbo Pascal from the 90s (my father built our family business on Turbo Pascal then Delphi through the 80s and 90s, so I grew up with it around the house).

I just wish you'd dial back the combative tone of your comments on HN. You've been engaging in a lot of political/ideological battle recently, and it would be good if you could remind yourself of the guidelines and make an effort to use HN in the intended spirit.

We're trying for curious conversation here. Different perspectives about economics are very welcome. Slurs and swipes are not.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"Trickle-down" economics is a direct subsidy for high-income earners meant to spur demand. That's the opposite of what increasing the housing supply does.

Totally wrong strawman missing the bigger point. It's still a vague, misguided utopian ideology focused on helping the rich supposedly "overproduce" while doing nothing for everyone else. That's trickle-down economics 101.

Well, you have the economics wrong, and our ability to handwave at each other about whose policy is "miguided" and "utopian" seems like a pretty boring conversation. Regardless: it's obviously not "trickle-down economics". Trickle-down economics are policies that deliberately and directly subsidize the wealthy in the hopes of spurring demand.

Supply and demand is not an ideology, it’s the most fundamental way that pricing works in a capitalist society. Has been studied for centuries. To think that supply and demand would not apply to housing and instead be trickle down economics is a hell of a statement.

The Supply and Demand model makes some assumptions that are not always true (perfect competition, for example).

The model isn’t an ideology, it is just a model. But there are a lot of ideological beliefs around this stuff. Some people seem to think that all markets have perfect competition, or that the resulting efficient pricing is inherently always good.

Housing seems pretty far from perfect competition to me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_competition#Idealizing...

How about for fun, instead of rhetorical devices and snarky projection, just look at the facts. The data on effects of zoning reform in places like Minneapolis and others, about where housing is cheaper wherever it's easier to build, about rent dropping ( https://denverite.com/2025/07/25/denver-rent-prices-drop-q2/) when you build way more units, etc.

Trickle down was a Reagan thing.

I'm very confused by your statements.

I mean it was the Big Beautiful Bill that just added 3-5 trillion in debt and reduced taxes on the very wealthy. I don't think those impotent Dems had any sway in this.

Dems are also beholden to the wealthy--not sure they tried that hard, overall.

Then you're too focused on political concerns. Neoliberalism doesn't recognize political parties, it recognizes money. As Gore Vidal would say, the Property party.

To avoid confusion: neoliberalism has not much to do with the liberals (Democrats). It's closer to libertarianism, but only about money.

I think I was confused (speed) reading through it and hit the Democrats part and was just thinking to myself... They have extremely limited power right now, and aren't passing laws?

There are some wild political takes on the internet sometimes, and it can be hard to parse out exactly what the person is trying to say (especially if the reader failed their speed reading comprehension ;-) )

Neoliberalism, trickle down, abundance. They are all similar and/or the same.

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