mcbruiser3 (u/mcbruiser3)

mcbruiser3 commented on Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/kimsk112

eli_gottlieb · 8 years ago

>Do you want to eliminate rent?

Yes. Land should be held by housing cooperatives or by private owner-occupiers. Rentiers can go find a line of business that contributes to society.

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

please feel free to start up a coop then. nothing is stopping you and your friends from doing that. have at it, and good luck.

edit: apparently some people don't like this comment because it means you have to help yourself instead of the gov't giving you other people's money. get a life.

mcbruiser3 commented on Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/kimsk112

toomuchtodo · 8 years ago

No, no one is advocating for eliminating rent. I (EDIT: removed "We") am advocating for tilting the scales back towards labor though.

* No depreciation allowance on rental property that is almost always going to appreciate [1]

* No 1031 exchanges, deferring capital gains forever [2]

* No mortgage interest deduction, which encourages the wealthy to bid up real estate since their leverage is tax advantaged. [3]

* Co-Ops acquiring property for renting to citizens when possible [4]

[1] https://www.biggerpockets.com/blogs/2728/41560-understanding...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Revenue_Code_section_...

[3] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/05/shame-m...

[4] http://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/in-berlin-a-model-fo...

EDIT: @ mcbruiser3: When I say "we" (which I removed above), people who share my progressive political view that people/humans/"labor" should be treated with priority over capital and rentseeking.

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

only fair if you reduce the tax burden dramatically as well. this would not just impact "evil landlords" but most of middle class as well.

and who is "we" exactly?

mcbruiser3 commented on Rising Rents Are Pushing More Tenants Past the Breaking Point bloomberg.com/news/articl... · Posted by u/kimsk112

_wc0m · 8 years ago

Rent is an amazingly effective means of redistributing wealth upwards. I have easily paid over £100k rent in my life, always to people substantially richer than I am.

Always enjoyed this Churchill quote - from 1909!

Roads are made, streets are made, services are improved, electric light turns night into day, water is brought from reservoirs a hundred miles off in the mountains -- and all the while the landlord sits still. Every one of those improvements is effected by the labor and cost of other people and the taxpayers. To not one of those improvements does the land monopolist, as a land monopolist, contribute, and yet by every one of them the value of his land is enhanced. He renders no service to the community, he contributes nothing to the general welfare, he contributes nothing to the process from which his own enrichment is derived.

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

I love how some folks complain about paying rent as if they have no choices, as if they're somehow indentured servants or serfs beholden to the landed gentry or something.

The truth is you do have choices, even in tough times. Find a way to save money for a down payment and buy some property. Maybe even become a landlord yourself.

mcbruiser3 commented on After Universal Basic Income, the Flood medium.com/p/after-univer... · Posted by u/simonsarris

jahnu · 8 years ago

> I think many of the UBI supporters know

A supposition. Fine. Opinion is ok although supporting evidence would be nice.

> UBI is fundamentally about ratcheting up redistribution, not ensuring that people's necessities are met

Declaration of fact without supporting evidence. An argument based on an unsupported opinion.

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

common sense requires no supporting evidence.

mcbruiser3 commented on Study Suggests Inequality Can Be Fixed with Wealth Redistribution, Not Tax Cuts motherboard.vice.com/en_u... · Posted by u/lnguyen

rosser · 8 years ago

The vast majority of the "rich" are beneficiaries of generational wealth. They didn't "figure out how to succeed"; they were literally handed everything they have, without ever having to earn a damned thing.

If your definition of "success" is "being born to the right parents", you're advocating an even more unequal society than the one we already have. That is straight-up feudal.

EDIT: phrasing.

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

inherited wealth often disappears by the third generation

mcbruiser3 commented on Study Suggests Inequality Can Be Fixed with Wealth Redistribution, Not Tax Cuts motherboard.vice.com/en_u... · Posted by u/lnguyen

uoaei · 8 years ago

Did that money come into their hands completely voluntarily?

Likely not. When you buy something you need to survive, can that be said to be a "voluntary" purchase? So when that money ends up in the hands of the owners of the productive machines, they get rich, but are they doing so because of purely "voluntary" participation in the economy?

So then why do I have to pay private individuals for things I need to live, and they don't have to pay back into the system that gave them the infrastructure to earn this money in the first place?

mcbruiser3 · 8 years ago

> Did that money come into their hands completely voluntarily?

Yes, if it's in the form of an investment. An investment is a risk, and like it or not, investments are a vital part of any economy. In may cases investments are how small businesses and entrepreneurs get capitalized because banks are much more risk averse. So why punish such a critical segment of the economy? You'll only end up moving the money into other areas that have less benefit for the rest of society.