Socialists should embrace luxury apartments
ft.com
ft.com
Now affordable apartments, which have dispensed with the limestone or quartz countertops and the imported Italian tile floors and all the other fancy bits and baubles that jack up the price by 50% or more, THAT is what we need a lot more of. Not drab or dreary accommodations, but thoughtfully designed places that maximize livability while minimizing cost.
Let me see a low-cost but functionally robust and well-built apartment that won’t need major repairs or upgrades for 30-50 years, and I would gladly see a small part of my taxes carved out to lower the monthly costs that renters are faced with.
The Vienna model is particularly apropos to this situation.
Because what we need is housing that is trivially affordable to ALL of the working class, and not just the parasite class.
And the true measure of any society is how they support and take care of their most vulnerable members.
I mean, Fully Automated Luxury Gay Space Communism sounds fun and all, but at what cost to the environment? Is it warmed-over trickle-down economics? Why are the progressive taxes on those people so low that they can afford a luxury apartment, and how did they make that money in the first place?
Just how deluxe is "luxury"? Is an extra 25% of living space per person (and a room of one's one) sufficient luxury? Because what I've seen, "luxury" is a never-ending hedonic treadmill as rich people judge their luxury by what even richer people can afford.
Lastly, the FT is the newspaper for the already-well-off, with summer homes in France and fancy kitchens, who likely want comfort that the luxury they have is justified.
The general argument (which I’m reconstructing from having read it elsewhere) is that the housing market is one thing. Rich people will occupy the top but it’s a single pool. So increasing supply anywhere in the pool alleviates price pressure from the whole pool.
Studies support this theory. Adding luxury homes reduces price pressure by the same amount as adding affordable homes. But it’s an easier sell for developers because they can make more money.
There’s probably a limit to how effective the strategy can be, but the current market is nowhere near that limit.
When you say "reconstructing from having read it elsewhere", does that mean you also didn't read the linked-to FT piece?
The "but it’s a single pool" cannot be a correct summary as there are multiple levels of luxury apartments.
Someone with $20 million is rich, and someone with $20 billion is rich, but these are very different levels of rich.
The general argument about the hedonic treadmill is the expectations rise with wealth, but the happiness and pleasure do not. The person with $20 million looks at what a person with $100 million can get, and wants more. This drives the need for ever-more luxury apartments.
There is of course some limit, as $30/hour isn't enough for a luxury apartment. But the affordable apartments get further away, or replaced with luxury apartments, and their middle manager bosses, who want their bonuses, are incentivized to use wage theft, poor working conditions, job insecurity, etc. to extract more profits while minimizing costs. Thus we have the opinion "there are no ethical billionaires", which implies there should be an upper bound to what is acceptable luxury.
rekabis specifically called out the Vienna model, which doesn't follow the same 'easier sell for developers' logic you referred to, because it uses different market incentives, including limited-profit housing associations, to build housing.
Because if you can't ration via price, the only other way is via time.
Do you think socialists should embrace higher prices for everyone over longer times for everyone?
Even without an explicit wait list, I've been saving money for years and still don't have enough for a down payment to own in the neighborhood I prefer. The price growth seems to match my savings.
And unlike a wait list, I don't have a rough ETA on when I'll have enough money.
It's not like there's only a single price vs. wait list time trade-off. I could live in the suburbs, where it's certainly cheaper, but where commute time increases and local options are reduced.
I think that finding reasonable housing quickly, where you can wait two years until moving into your desired housing area, sounds embraceable.
You complain about saving for a nice house, but the idea of waiting for some government agency to give me a unit, only to potentially outgrow it or need to move for work, and then deal with it all over again, seems absolutely disastrous to me. I want agency in my living situation, not whatever the government deems appropriate for me.
FWIW, I'm saving up for an apartment.
As I understand it, the Vienna model has city-owned housing ("government agency"), but also has housing cooperatives and nonprofit housing - the latter two are not government owned, and still have a housing queue. I take it you are fine with the latter?
Just, I imagine, like you are okay with wanting to buy in a new housing project, only to have the developer say that all the lots are bid, but you can do on the wait list in case someone drops out?
If you rent, do you want agency in your living situation, or whatever the landlord deems appropriate for the property?
How disastrous would it seem if your sibling and spouse died, leaving 2 kids (8 and 10), which is too many for your small loft, so you need to move somewhere, but you can't afford to move? Wouldn't you like the government to help you have some agency?
If there is a huge queue of people in a waitlist for a housing development that is a direct, crystal clear signal to that company, and others, that more of that thing should be built.
None of those examples you gave are agency. What you are describing is dependency and a welfare state. And no, it is not more "stable" or safe, given how elections lately have been going.
I don't want my house, for my children, to be decided by the whims of some government stooge in the Trump admin, thanks.