Quester me these ansions, if you please:
- What on earth law of economics, or even commonsense principle, suggests that subsidies lower costs? Inquiring minds want to know, and don’t just say, “And a miracle happened,” unless you can provide me data that shows over the long run that it works. That is, don’t tell me some rich Connecticut community is making it work when a small number of people are receiving subsidies from a huge number of ultra-rich taxpayers. Don’t say some since-abandoned experiment in California worked for six months once upon a time. Just tell me how, say, a person willing to buy a $100 item with a $20 discount, wouldn’t be willing to pay $90 and split the discount with the seller.
- If landlords rent $1000 properties, and government says 10 percent of those properties must be offered at $800; will the landlord (a) go out of business, (b) sell all his assets, or (c) jack the rents up, approximately on average, $1333 to offset his loss? And then, when all the $800 properties go, should somebody who could have paid $1000 for a place but is now priced out of the market (a) rent in out-county, (b) demand more subsidies, or (c) weep?
- If government gets in the landlord business, how much overhead should the bureaucrats be able to collect from rents as compensation for their services? This surely will not be collected from the poor people, so at what point do the rich decide to maximize their investments somewhere with a lower tax burden?
- If the goal is affordable housing, why do we expand the definition to include access to food and transit as well as amenities, like good schools, that only the rich, or those willing to trade something off, have historically afforded? I may be wrong, but exposure seems more fatal than stigmatizationality.
The Mountain Xpress asked local experts on the housing crisis to write an essay about the problem. Here are the responses: 1, 2, 3.
