• TrackinDaKraken@lemmy.world
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    14 hours ago

    Trump just hatched a plan to lower mortgage rates, because clearly that’s why no one can afford housing.

    They know full-well we can’t afford housing because they refuse to pay higher wages, but that’s money flowing the “wrong” way, so that’s not going to happen as long as the billionaires hold the reins.

      • chuckleslord@lemmy.world
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        10 hours ago

        Get the fed to lower rates. It’s why he’s attacking Powell now, he’s not lowering them fast enough.

        It’s a stupid as shit plan, cause this is the only lever the federal government has to pull for a recession and pulling it early causes increased inflation, but Trump ain’t much of one of those thought-havers.

      • [deleted]@piefed.world
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        12 hours ago

        I assume it is either a concept of a plan or actually something that makes it even worse while dressed up as something that sounds positive. It is always one of those two things with Trump.

    • Asafum@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      Mainly yes wages and houses that were 150k like 6 years ago now costing 500k is definitely a major issue, but I have heard that the interest rates are stopping people from selling because they can’t justify picking up a new much higher rate even if they wanted to downsize/move.

      I think a lot of boomers might sell if the interest rate can go down, but who knows if that will actually affect prices… They might just pull some greedy b.s “I only sell at max price or hold it for the kids.”

      • Drusas@fedia.io
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        5 hours ago

        They might just pull some greedy b.s “I only sell at max price or hold it for the kids.”

        Pretty sure that’s what most people aim for.

  • BeefandSquints@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    14 hours ago

    It really gets so old. The only way to avoid housing costs being insane is multi generational living or having a bunch of roommates. Ironically, this allows for better community activism which is why they fought so hard for individual family homes after WW2. It’s rough that capitalism always allows for short sighted idiots to be the ones that excel.

    • Drusas@fedia.io
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      5 hours ago

      multi generational living or having a bunch of roommates

      These are the same thing, except that you’re related to your roommates in the first case and may or may not be in the second.

  • dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works
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    5 hours ago

    Based on inflation? Really?

    Either this is true and someone lived for like 35 years in a place, or it’s an anti landlord load of crap.

    There are plenty of honest reasons to be against landlords without having to invent them.

    • daannii@lemmy.world
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      2 hours ago

      She could be talking about a 30 year change.

      Im 40. When I was 20 I rented my first apartment for $300.

      That was 2005.

      That apartment is now renting for $700. Rural Illinois.

      So that’s just in 20 years. In rural areas.

      In cities it’s been way worse.

  • Jo Miran@lemmy.ml
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    13 hours ago

    1994, I paid $225 for a two bedroom duplex with a carport and a yard. Was it a shithole? Yes. Was it a two bedroom duplex I could afford as a student while fixing PCs on the side for fixed income retirees? Also yes.

  • DarkCloud@lemmy.world
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    10 hours ago

    That’s Neoliberalism. It follows in it’s Austrian School and Chicago School economic traditions, which claim that deregulated markets are compatible with leftwing social and cultural values, when they’re not.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism#Traditions

    This is the Neoliberal economy working as intended. Of course it’s going to created an ever expanding wealth gap. Neoliberalism is stupid, and not even remotely leftwing.

    It’s centrists and rightwing economics “leftwashed”. You’re all being played, tricked into being rightwing without having to admit it. Try that link if you don’t believe me.

    • Abedtime@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      Nobody believes Neoliberalism is left wing lol, it’s virtually the most radically pro-capital ideology.

  • blarghly@lemmy.world
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    6 hours ago

    Downvoting this because it does not belong in this sub. Blaming one of the seven deadly sins for poor social outcomes is talk that belongs in a religious sub, like those dedicated to Christianity or Communism.

    Neoliberals see this sort of “greed” more as straightforward common sense - after all, if two renters want to rent a unit, and one can pay $100 and the other will pay $150, of course you will rent to the person who is willing to pay more. The people who criticize this sort of logic, I imagine, think of themselves as inhabiting the role of the poorer renter - but in the real world, they could just as easily end up in the position of the richer renter who now must navigate a bizzare renting landscape where they might not be able to find a place to live even if they are willing to pay more. Similarly, if two potential hires with identical skills apply for a job, of course you will hire the one willing to work for less.

    Neoliberals, on the other hand, think about things for more than 2 seconds and ask questions about what the actual cause of rising housing prices or stagnating wages. “Greed” is a constant - landlords were greedy 10 years ago just as much as they are today, so we can’t possibly say that “greed” is the cause of inflated rents. Instead, we consider what policies or market forces led to this situation (and importantly, we gather evidence to determine what is causing them), and then we consider various proposals for courses of action to correct the matter. For example, rising housing costs may be driven by more people wanting to live alone, growing populations in in-demand cities, NIMBY policies which restrict the construction of new housing, localized housing monopolies, or any number of other things. From there, we might say that we should liberalize laws around housing construction, increase subsidies for poor people to afford housing or for developers to build affordable housing, investigate anticompetitive practices between large landlord corporations and throw their leaders in jail if we find they have been breaking the law, or tax vacant or underutilized land in urban areas to incentivize the owner to develop or sell the land rather than speculating.

    The other reason I dislike this post is because it implies that good personal finance advice is irrelevant to people today. It isn’t. Obviously things are worse for people today than they were in previous decades, but being financially well off isn’t a discreet state that is either true or false. You can be better or worse off financially by every dollar you have access to. It is crazy to have someone argue that it makes good financial sense for them to order door dash 3 nights per week “because I’m broke either way, so why not enjoy myself?” Leaving aside for a second that whether or not someone delivers food to your front door isn’t a good metric for a happy and fulfilling life, being “broke” is not a static state. This person will discover this once they start trying to not be broke. The difference between being $5,000 and $15,000 in credit card debt isn’t nothing. In fact, it is something very specific - it is $10,000! Yeah, not eating fancy avocado toast might not be the difference between owning or not owning a house, but it could be the difference between being able to pay for a car repair out of pocket or having to take on debt to take care of it and then needing to dig yourself out of the debt hole.

    This doesn’t diminish the need to create policy-level solutions to address wages or housing affordability. But jfc, yes, you should practice sensible personal finance. No average individual can really control what the billionaires or politicians do - but they can 100% take control of their personal financial descisions and end up way, way better off in 10 years time if they just make reasonable descisions.

      • blarghly@lemmy.world
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        22 minutes ago

        You seem to be trying to make this into some kind of moralistic gotcha. But, well, I’m going to ignore that because it isn’t related to my point, which is that regardless of your financial status, making good financial decisions results in better outcomes than making bad financial decisions.

        For example, suppose you are living on minimum wage, renting an apartment for 50% of your monthly income. But then, because you are a strawman in an internet argument, you decide to set the other half of your money on fire each month, and meet the remainder of your monthy expenses by accruing debt. I don’t think it should be controversial to say that this is a bad idea. Setting your money on fire and not setting it on fire result in two very different, very tangible outcomes which will come to fruition in not too long. Note that I am not saying that the “don’t set your money on fire” option is going to lead to fabulous riches and a Lambo. Success here could simply be keeping your head above water, or slowing your slide into debt while you try to figure something else out - which doesn’t sound very appealing! But it sounds a heck of a lot more appealing than accumulating endless debt, tanking your credit score, losing your ability to take on more debt, losing your apartment when you fall behind on rent, not being able to find a new apartment anymore because you now have terrible credit, and moving back in with your abusive parents who smell like cabbage. Yeah, you are deciding between bad and worse, but the obvious choice is “bad” and the obvious way to get there is “don’t set your money on fire.”

    • chicken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      6 hours ago

      The other reason I dislike this post is because it implies that good personal finance advice is irrelevant to people today

      I overall agree with what you’re saying, but I think this post might be referring more to advice coming from a place of ignorance of the current reality. If you’re trying to tell someone how to manage their life when you don’t actually have experience of what they are facing, it can be less than helpful and not very supportive. Also, at some point “here is how you can optimize your outcomes in a largely hopeless situation” isn’t very helpful either; if 90% of your income is going to pay rent, information about how to optimize the way you spend the remaining 10% is probably the wrong thing to be focused on.

    • grue@lemmy.world
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      7 hours ago

      That’s literally illegal.

      We have to fix the zoning code first.

        • grue@lemmy.world
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          3 hours ago

          Yes, but only in the sense that it’s a prerequisite to it.

          The point is that it’s not just about waiting for developers to do their thing; it requires political action from the general public. You, each person reading this, have to get off your butt and help make it happen by lobbying your local reps for zoning reform.