Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Having everyone simply earn more is not a solution to a housing crunch caused by restricted supply. If everyone just made more, then the houses will simply become that much more expensive until again the workers cannot afford them.
If you have a million people with jobs in an area and only 750,000 housing units, you either allow more construction, people shack up together, or people get priced out.* It doesn't matter if everyone pulls in a billion dollars, it is impossible to have a million people in 750,000 housing units unless people share housing. If people earn a billion dollars, then the houses will cost so much that you need to make 2 billion to afford one.
It's supply and demand.
And the ONLY cure is to either move the jobs elsewhere, just accept that you'll be living with others, or stop over-regulating new construction.
You will never, ever solve the problem with "just make more money".
*Of course, there are married couples and families wanting to live together, not just singles, so one would have to modify this argument based on household sizes, but the principle is the same.
Something similar has already happened in my city...
The number of Housing Vouchers was increased to more people could secure housing.
The problem is only 1 in 5 new Voucher holders was able to secure housing because there simply was not enough supply in the range.
So increasing the number of Vouchers is like raising the wages... more people with means are now chasing the same supply.
Well I was wrapped up thinking about condos and townhouses (see below) plus there are no affordable SFR here, only a few condos and townhouses.
But you asked for examples of affordable homes across the country - not just where you have chosen to live. That's what I gave you. You don't acknowledge that - you just jump to some other argument as if that's what the discussion is about.
Dependant minors open the door to a myriad for programs and assistance...
That might be an unintended consequence of Congress ignoring the childless poor while falling over itself to give goodies to families with children. You know, family values (R) and me-too-ism (D) and all that.
The poor fails themselves by having kids before theu are financially prepared.
Of course! That's it! Because before we had any form of social welfare whatsoever, there was no poverty. Right.
What's different now is that we've criminalized child labor and at the same time, technological changes have made children unsuitable for many of our jobs. Kids are not the reason for poverty.
Besides, if everyone waited until they were "financially prepared" to have children, we'd be extinct or close to it. It's hard to be fully financially prepared in the prime child bearing years. Once you hit 40, you might be more "prepared," but your child-bearing years are walking out the door at that point.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
