Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent

Re:Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent by Retric on Monday October 24, 2016 @02:48PM (#12781629)

Increasing home ownership lowers economic growth. People tend to move jobs less often and have longer commutes both of which reduces economic efficiency. People also tend to rent places which more closely match their needs further reducing waste. AKA, renting and there is no need for a kids room until you have kids, but when buying you may need to plan for your needs in 5+ years out.

Further, people really do rent the same place for 30+ years when their job and family situation is stable, which incentives similar levels of improvement.

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Re:Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent by Spooky23 on Monday October 24, 2016 @02:55PM (#12781697)

Source?

Housing has driven US GDP growth since WW2 or earlier, so that's a pretty big leap.

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Re:Most Germans don’t buy their homes, they rent by Retric on Monday October 24, 2016 @03:24PM (#12781964)

Housing != home ownership. Anyway, I have read this a few places, but here is the first link I found. "Regions with higher home ownership created fewer new businesses, had longer commute times, and lower rates of labor mobility." http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/05/08/the-deep-do...

Further, GDP is a very short term view of the economy. Daycare is a classic example where going from an informal to formal system nominally increases GDP much more than the net increase in value.

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