Gotta tax the rich.

It’ll have two effects… 1) not as much money being dumped into real estate. 2) more money available for social programs.

Though on the other side of things some expectations may need to change. Owning a house is going to be really only possible if you live in a rural area. Having a house in the suburbs and having a couple of cars in the garage that you use for everything from commuting to work to picking up groceries will have a high environmental cost so that style of life should be expensive.

Though we can improve the livability of apartments, and lower rent (or mortgage costs for a condo) for high density apartments. Make them larger improve nearby greenspaces nearby so people can comfortable raise a family in high density residential areas.

A lot of the real estate thing is problematic politically. Everyone says they want housing prices to go down, but people that already own a house really don’t. The value of their house will drop if that happens. But given that the suburban ideal isn’t actually all that ideal considering environmental factors, having the price of a house stay high while reducing the cost while increasing the quality of high density housing feels like it should be a politically achievable goal.

But yeah tax the rich, they aren’t all that motivated to to fix housing prices given their current investments in real estate will lose value if they do that. Municipal governments aren’t likely going to zone high density housing either since they get more tax revenue per person from low density housing. If people in low density housing use cars instead of transit, tax revenue - costs of services per person is higher than for people living in high density housing. I’d suggest changing how municipalities raise taxes to avoid this, but saying we should get rid of property taxes sounds like some pro-wealthy kind of thing so isn’t politically feasible. So… tax the rich use the money for social programs, building better public transit and building high density housing.

So yeah the expectation of living the suburban dream isn’t really feasible in most places because of environmental factors. But living a different kind of dream living in a spacious apartment with a green space nearby with reliable public transit available to take people where they need to go seems achievable. And dare I say, may even be better than the suburban dream. But we gotta tax the rich to make it happen.