Long way home: Blamed for affordability crisis, Liberals look to pivot on housing
Long way home: Blamed for affordability crisis, Liberals look to pivot on housing
Experts say the Canadian housing crisis poses a great risk to the incumbent government in the next election if it doesn't take drastic action soon.
"This has become probably the most important both economic and political problem facing the country right now," said Tyler Meredith, a former head of economic strategy and planning for Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.
"And especially given the significant emphasis the government has put on immigration and the relationship between immigration and the housing market, there is a need to do more."
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Anyone who votes for liberals hoping they'll fix housing issues is an idiot. They haven't done anything about it other than give handouts. Housing prices have still gone up and its only gonna me painful to correct the housing issues in Canada.
They keep trying to push that's it's a supply issue but I see it more of a price issue. Housing is over priced. You can build all you want but at market prices it's too expensive for people to buy.
I think it's not just the Liberals, but the Conservatives that are at fault. Neither parties have done much of anything when they were in power to help this and other significant stagnation issues over the least two or three decades.
At least for Toronto, the federal and provincial governments had to be punched in the sides to make public transit investments after being forgotten for most of a half century, and even then the new constructions are still quite inadequate and will require at least two more decades of consistent work before things reach a decent level, presuming that other areas don't get worse in the meantime.
It's unfair to just blame the Liberals. All our leading parties suck because they see themselves as invulnerable. They've gotten used to being an oligarchy, and the NPD is no longer scaring them, but instead have become a part of the oligarchy. Layton was great, Mulcair was okay, but Singh is just a puppy following Trudeau. Without someone new (it can be the Rhinoceros Party for all I care) getting a decent number of seats to become a legitimate threat to the oligarchy and make them actually move their asses for real and positive change, I think we're stuck with nothing but corrupt personal interests.
There's the inconvenient fact that housing is way more provincial and municipal than federal. The feds can't (and shouldn't) be able to tell a town/city what they can or can't do as per the rules of our democracy.
That being said, the Feds should be building their own public/rent geared to income housing.
One of the biggest hurdles is NIMBY voters who alway turn up and vote against density and constantly jam the system regardless of need - and those who need affordable housing generally don't show up to vote.
If the feds build their own housing, or blast provincial/local governments who are preventing the proliferation of Federally funded housing the narrative should hopefully flip.
Currently its the spider-man meme of feds, premiers, and municipal governments pointing at each other as the source of housing inequality - and all of them are correct. But it's lack of public understanding that allows the inaction to continue.
This isn't something that needs to be profitable, it's fulfilling the basic role of government working for the people and giving them value.
This would also put pressure on developers collectively refusing to build due to costs. If you're not developing, the land moves to the feds to be developed instead.
Some things need to exist outside of profit seeking.
The media aiming ire at the Federal Liberals isn't just unhelpful, it's actually extremely counter-productive.
Like, let's say you work at $BIGCORP and you're embezzling, and you're not hiding it well. And the CFO says "$BIGCORP has an embezzling problem! We need to fix this urgently! As a result, I'm raising pressure on SomeOtherGuy to stop this problem!"
You're not SomeOtherGuy, you're you. What do you do? Do you stop embezzling? Do you shut up and keep doing it? Do you quietly encourage the CFO to keep the pressure on SomeOtherGuy to fix the problem?
Because as long as the press is aiming the ire at the feds, they're keeping the heat off of the people most able to fix the problem.
Fundamentally, I think the press (and therefore the people consuming the press) is too dumb for federalism. We are not mentally capable of making informed political decisions about accountability in a 3-tier system.
Generally agreed, but also remember that the federal government sets immigration targets, which affects demand
It is a fundamental issue with the way we have been building and running the urban and economic fabric of our cities. Car centric design and infinite growth housing goals have pushed our cities into debt building sprawling suburbia. The economy also shifted away from manufacturing and production towards more service industries that support suburbia and add less value to the overall economy. Canadians have been spending more on necessities while making less in wages and part of this is influenced by the financially unstable ways we build our cities, the reliance on automobiles, and a less productive per capita economy.
While I disagree about service industries bringing less value to the economy (remember, the technical term service industry doesn't refer to the hospitality industries like hotels and restaurants, but instead things like programming, design, and making movies).
On the other hand, yes, suburbia is the death of economies and livability. I hate how people are more willing to spend two hours driving 100km every day to work than to live without a lawn but be in walking distance of everything you need every week. And that doesn't take into consideration that suburbia actually costs tax dollars to maintain rather than high density mixed uses urban areas that actually generate taxes instead. People forget that the downtown areas of most cities are actually subsidizing the suburbs, rather than their land taxes paying for themselves.
The subsidizing of suburban development is the biggest issue of it all in my opinion. It is poor economic and land use policy that almost exclussively promotes car centric infrastructure.
They don't want to bring the prices down because they've made their own wealth and that of other wealthy property owners, and a good chunk of Canada's economy, dependent on the prices staying high. So they have to pay lip service and make statements about how they want to make housing affordable without actually, you know, bringing the prices down.
They also don't want to bring it town because the dumb homeowners will just blame the current government when the prices correct themselves. It's suicide for any party to willingly tank the housing prices. It's only gonna get worse the longer we wait to do it. And it's gonna be global because we aren't the only country effected by it.
Or rent.
I had to move from my apartment to a rooming house. Next is the street. :(
Supply and demand are key factors in pricing. If no one wanted to buy houses, prices would go down. Of course, people foolishly want to live in dwellings rather than under bridges, so there will always be some amount of demand. Therefore, increasing the number of dwellings will have an impact on both rental prices and house prices. People can still charge whatever they want for their house, but if there is something more desirable for a lower price, it isn't going to sell. Likewise for rental properties, landlords want to make as much as possible, but vacant units bring in less money than units with reduced prices. Again, that only matters when there is a sufficient supply of residences for the population.
Supply and demand are key factors in pricing. If no one wanted to buy houses, prices would go down
I agree that both increasing supply and decreasing demand would move prices down. At the same time, while the different measures that we can take to increase supply would require months if not years to have an effect, there are several things we can do to reduce demand overnight. Here are some examples:
- Increase taxes on empty homes and homes owned by non-resident landlords. For example, by increasing property taxes while at the same time providing a refundable tax credit for your primary home when you file your income taxes
- Reduce yearly immigration targets and reduce the number of other visas, such as student visas
- Do not automatically grant citizenship to babies born in Canada unless their mother is legally residing here
So...reduce the demand for homes purchased for income purposes and increase the supply of houses available on the general market.
But yes, those are all excellent ideas and I hope someone implements them soon. But since about a third of MPs have at least 2 homes, it could be a tough sell.