The invisible laws that led to America’s housing crisis
The invisible laws that led to America’s housing crisis
In the 1910s, US cities began enacting policies that would shape neighborhoods and, unintentionally, lay the roots for the severe housing shortage today: single-family zoning laws.
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Yea they tried to make America into Camazotz.
I am a builder and have watched this mess get worse and my solution is to get rid of air bnb and corporate investment in housing and to tax the holy hell out of second and third homes.
Edit: Camazotz is the mundane world in A Wrinkle in Time. Its description always had me picturing the suburbs.
Been saying for years the easy way out of this mess is that residential property may only be owned by individuals, and to prevent hoarding, add an additional 10% to the property and sales tax of each property above one. So your 2nd property costs a mere 110%, but your 11th property will be assessed at 200% of the taxes.
We would also need some enforced rent controls, so that expense isn't passed on to the renters.
Honestly, the taxation proposal would have the same effect as simply outlawing corporate ownership of residential property, with the added benefit of temporarily pulling in tax revenue until the hoarders can unload their properties.
Not sure how this would apply to multifamily residential properties or things like hotels or campgrounds, though.
Hotels are already in a different class than residential properties. They’re taxed differently and have regulations on thing like cleanliness. Campgrounds are also different, they’re not intended for permanent residence.
One of the reasons Airbnb and its clones are bad is that they don’t have the regulations hotels do, so renters who expect safe conditions are sometimes fatally disappointed: https://medium.com/matter/living-and-dying-on-airbnb-6bff8d600c04
For those wondering like me, Camazotz is a Mayan bat spirit at the service of the lords of the underworld. So, I’m really not sure what to make of that reference.
Maybe they meant Camelot? Although that doesn't make much sense either, at least it's building-related.
Camazotz is the mundane world in A Wrinkle in Time and its description in that book always reminded me of the suburbs.
As a similar alternative, a Land Value Tax would be a good way to drive more efficient uses of land. Single family homes on large lots in cities would quickly become uneconomical.
Seriously how fucking hard is it to implement that? It seems so incredibly obvious.