Comment on What is an average person living in the US supposed to do about corporations raising prices?
chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 months agoMy point is that if you are currently bidding against wealthy financial interests as well as individuals just looking for a place to live, then giving everyone money will raise the buying power of those individuals relative to those interests.
phillaholic@lemm.ee 10 months ago
But it’s not going to increase supply, and somewhere around 70% of homes purchased last year were by individuals. Home prices will rise as individuals can bid higher than before.
The only solution is to build more housing.
chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 months ago
What if you remove individuals who already have a home from that number?
Again, consider relative buying power. Even if you aren’t more wealthy relative to the average person and that stays the same, being more wealthy relative to the wealthiest still gives you greater ability to buy a home. This can be true even if demand and prices rise, and would be true even if it was only 30% of buyers that you’re becoming more competitive against.
That really should be part of it, but ultimately it is not enough. If wealth inequality gets high enough, if the market regards labor as worthless enough, it isn’t going to matter how much housing there is, it will get repurposed as golf courses or something.
phillaholic@lemm.ee 10 months ago
I believe it only goes down from 70 to 55. A better shot for sure, but you’d still be overpaying and having to buy without an inspection etc.
I don’t see being more wealthy relative to the wealthiest as that beneficial in this scenario. They still have the ability to outbid if they want to.
Building more housing, particularly apartment building or condos that people can own is the simplest solution to the problem. Solving income equality is a massive task with no perfect solutions. Building more houses is straight forward.
chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com 10 months ago
Are you familiar with price elasticity of demand? If they have to pay a larger share of their wealth, they will buy fewer. If houses cost $100, couldn’t you think of reasons to buy more than one, where you wouldn’t if houses were priced within what you could afford but much more expensive than that?
IMO the distinction between income and wealth inequality is very important here. Income inequality is about jobs, wealth is about accumulated capital.