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A comment on Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pay August rent. Parent comment

Re:Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pa... by Weebs on Tuesday September 22, 2020 @10:30AM (#24554766)
Because landlords are trying to profit off of the conditions created by the broader local community. They make a bet on which space created by the community will allow them to extract more rent than the cost to maintain the building and pay the loan, and later sell the property for more than they paid.

Tenants are either members of the community who want a home, or are trying to provide a service to the community.

One group is trying to speculate on the value others will provide and get a cut, and they're able to do this because as they've ensured scarcity of affordable space. It's extraction

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Re:Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pa... by twblalock on Tuesday September 22, 2020 @01:30PM (#24557387)
It's not extraction, it's a service.

If there were no landlords, it would be impossible to start a business in NYC without buying a building. Most businesses would never be able to afford that. Thank goodness there are landlords who are willing to rent out their buildings!

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Re:Almost 90 percent of NYC bars and restaurants couldn’t pa... by Weebs on Wednesday September 23, 2020 @10:50AM (#24567767)
It's not either or, you don't have to have individual ownership for properties. A landlord can be replaced by a neighborhood cooperative that redirects the value produced from the building back into the community (schools, public service funding, etc.)

Private ownership and rent contracts is only one way of many to solve the problem of granting access to space without outright purchase.

Also, providing a service and extracting value from others work aren't mutually exclusive. Consider this: a foreign organization extracts natural resources, refines them, sells the new product back to the localsy (and other outside communities) for large profits that are mostly redirected outside of the native community.

I would clearly call that extraction, the fact that they also provide a service to the community doesn't negate that.

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