What happened was that good housing full of artists and musicians and other self-employed creatives began gentrifying, driving up property values, which drove up property taxes, which became unaffordable to the existing residents (who had owned their homes for a long time). Many (actually, most) of these artists had to sell and leave.
They often left for other cities. But hey at least the good houses everyone liked all got torn down to be replaced by McMansions for the influx of techbros.
Austin still has that slogan, "Keep Austin Weird." It failed. Austin isn't weird anymore. The University of Texas still is responsible for a lot of great stuff about Austin, but huge chunks of the city are just boring these days. There's certainly much less interesting culture happening. It's been airbnbified.
The existing residents (artists) made money by selling their appreciated houses. Those who could afford to remain were now in areas with less crime and poverty.
The new residents spent a ton of money to live in a place they themselves culturally diminished.
We should re-evaluate the winners and losers here.
Win/win, right?
It looks like - it might not be what you mean, but it looks like - you're saying 'good housing' is housing that has "artists and musicians and other self-employed creatives", as opposed to poor working people.
But yes, I think there is a sense in which people who are driven to create have some kind of ineffable, cultural capital that people without this drive do not have. So a neighborhood that is full of artists is more interesting, and therefore more valuable to spend time in, than one that isn't.
https://www.austinmonthly.com/in-photos-what-gentrification-...
I don't think many home owners got a price for their land that allowed them to buy a similar house elsewhere.
The world is far from an ideal model where what you get is what you deserve.
Note the history of the East Side power plant, which depressed property prices. Ditto, I-35 construction plans. The article says the plant will become a park now. After the new developers locked in purchases.
Nothing will fix it until some case goes up to the supreme court and results in some sort of "they were there first the .gov can piss off" doctrine.
Even renters in gentrifying areas may profit if housing construction outpaces population growth. Yes, they may have to move, but also the places they move to on their current budget may be nicer - because the people who can afford better have moved too.
That also raises property taxes, making the neighborhood unaffordable and driving them out.
> it's now a more pleasant area to live in.
For new wealthy residents. People who have spent lifetimes there don't want everything to change and have their communities destroyed.
> Yes, they may have to move, but also the places they move to on their current budget may be nicer - because the people who can afford better have moved too.
These are theoretical and very general averages. The actual individuals often do not benefit. Being forced to move is not a mere inconvenience to your theory.
That isn't theoretical. I just described the SF Bay Area.
Literally impossible unless:
1. People are living in multiple houses
2. New construction hasn't kept up with population growth
We're commenting on an article that says the exact same thing.
Economic theory says some things are theoretically impossible, no literally, but economic theory wouldn't say that here:
The local housing market is much more complex than supply and demand, with larger economic factors (e.g., interest rates), very imperfect information (affecting everyone from buyers, to sellers, real estate agents, lenders, etc.), coordination by landlords (e.g., RealPage), non-economic factors such as prejudice (or just a co-op board!), government actions, larger trends, temporary inefficiencies, etc.
Economic theory is useful, but it does not predict or circumscribe the immediate reality of individuals. Life is much more complicated than that.
Second, many factors are involved in a complex market; you and I don't know how much effect the supply had in this case. That you are interested in that input isn't evidence of its effect.
If the gentrification of an AA community occurs where the residents rent then they capture none of it and are forced out.
Where do the new residents of this now-8/10 community come from? Probably a place that was less than 8/10 - maybe it was 7. So now there's less demand for all the 7s and their rents decrease, allowing residents living in 6s to move there. And so on.
Assuming housing construction in the region has kept up with the population, even the renters who were forced out of the previously 3/10 community will likely find new housing in a 4/10 neighborhood at the same price. Their relationships from the old place were probably disrupted by the move (bad) but they also got better housing for the same money (good).
The key in this is housing construction must be allowed to increase with population.
When supply is artificially constrained, the old homes get torn down and replaced with luxurious ones - without increasing dwelling spaces available.
What did you hope to do by saying this?
It's not "better faith" to construct an entire alternative world for the user's comment to remove it from the actually existing implications of their point. I am not sure what that it is, but it certainly isn't a healthy exchange of ideas.
"I think we should burn down all the forests"; "Oh geeze that sounds like a terrible idea.."; "um it's actually pretty bad faith for you to assume they were talking about forests on Earth and not some bad evil forests that could hypothetically exist somewhere else..." taps the guidelines sign
The downsides of not building new housing at all are even worse than "gentrification" and they fall even heavier on the poor. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47434470
Also (imo) don't link to yourself like this! Especially when its to just another short comment in the same thread! Why do that??
I've been told off (by dang, no less) before for copy-pasting comments. There's no winning it seems.