Post A1rZSvmllphtVp7Rc8 by dazinism@social.coop
(DIR) More posts by dazinism@social.coop
(DIR) Post #A1q43OGlxD1yaTXB8S by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-03T23:04:59Z
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Autonomous vehicles are going to be awesome for society, but what I'm really excited about right now is autonomous farm equipment.Imagine solar/battery powered spider-like machines picking weeds day and night.Imagine how much marginal land will become arable when tractors can walk.
(DIR) Post #A1q4QUvNNSNZt5XpEe by wolf480pl@mstdn.io
2020-12-03T23:09:24Z
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@cjd imagine a corn harvester 3D-printed of PLA, autonomously supplying an autonomous 3D-printed PLA factory that 3D-prints more of those harvesters
(DIR) Post #A1q5aUpMh00AR943cm by seasharp@crowsnest.libre.audio
2020-12-03T23:22:27.148128Z
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@cjd autonomous night-time soil tending sounds pretty sweet.
(DIR) Post #A1q6Bi5mKyuUI7UF04 by meejah@mastodon.social
2020-12-03T23:11:56Z
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@cjd I think we could already farm "marginal" land .. but we value farmers so little that we pay them garbage and don't value high quality (e.g. organic) products.
(DIR) Post #A1qj2nbkMEMX0IBJ6u by meejah@mastodon.social
2020-12-03T23:14:58Z
1 likes, 1 repeats
@cjd ...and I think further automation will only continue the current trend of forcing amalgamation of farms into massive corporate entities. This is bad for the land and bad for the product. A true advance would be getting back to smaller farms with more "farmers (humans) per square km".
(DIR) Post #A1qj2npDY98bg4U46i by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-03T23:24:03Z
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@meejah Rolling back automation of food production means less food to go around, and no economic system is going to work around the fact that less means less.
(DIR) Post #A1qj2nz8xF4sAr7zZw by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T01:55:45Z
1 likes, 1 repeats
@cjdI don't think that is true. Small or sustenance farmers grow considerably more food per acre than large industrialised farms.https://www.grain.org/article/entries/4929-hungry-for-land-small-farmers-feed-the-world-with-less-than-a-quarter-of-all-farmland @meejah
(DIR) Post #A1qj2oCy7q8Wrjb280 by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T04:21:43Z
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@dazinism @meejah You raise a good point, James C. Scott's Seeing Like a State discussed at length the suffering which has come from trying to over-plan things: especially governments telling farmers how to grow crops.It would seem that a market driven system ought not to have the same central planning failures, but factoring in access to credit it does seem possible that less efficient factory farmers could dominate their smaller more efficient peers.
(DIR) Post #A1qj2oQ5L4d1WPjVZY by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T04:30:25Z
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@dazinism @meejah But if factory farms are actually less efficient then that's awesome news because it means all we need to do is figure out the missing pieces (e.g. micro-finance) and small farmers will be able to squeeze the big players out of the game.
(DIR) Post #A1rZSvVkn660f39r5k by meejah@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T06:38:14Z
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@cjd @dazinism Our economy doesn't care about "efficiency", it cares about profit. So "food per acre" doesn't really matter, it's "profit per labour-hour" .. so yes it seems absolutely obvious that a well cared-for 10 acres can out-produce many more acres that are produced with a profit metric in mind
(DIR) Post #A1rZSvmllphtVp7Rc8 by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:01:53Z
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@meejah Yeah totally. Farming efficiencies are aimed at profits not food yields. As labour is a significant cost, returns per labour unit is a major influence. Having said that small farms can provide good/stable profits and tend to provide many many more jobs (which can be argued is economically more valuable). @cjd I think theres much that needs considering (some not always immediately visible) when talking about agricultural production, state intervention and global markets. 1/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSwGXz7Wh0B3E1o by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:07:46Z
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@meejah @cjd It hasn't necessarily been governments telling farmers how to grow crops. The few globally dominating large agricultural input corporates (Big Ag) have been pushing their products and the farming systems that favour then heavily for decades. Sometimes this is done in partnership with governments, sometimes aid agencies (we give poor farmers seeds and the chemicals to grow them), and sometimes by having 'farm advisors'/agronomists who offer their 'advice' for free to farmers.
(DIR) Post #A1rZSwVR5lR5kM17Ee by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:26:42Z
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@meejah @cjd Yields may be higher initially, which can obviously be very attractive to a struggling farmer, but over time the soil degrades & the weeds become resistant to the herbicides. The seed varieties that are promoted have been bred to do well under these conditions, but are not particularly resilient. Crops often fail if not given regular treatment with herbicides, fungicides, pesticides & fertilizer -all of which are derived from fossil fuelsTrouble is pretty much all research 3/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSwqhogRwoJy6O8 by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:34:34Z
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@meejah @cjd that is funded by government and (not surprisingly) industry goes into exploring how to do this high input system of agriculture better.The alternative, more sustainable, low input, agricultural methods (not necessarily organic, which in some cases is high input/industrialised) just don't have the research, promotion and data to back them up.Theres also a cultural issue - farmers that dare to try do things differently are often mocked by their peers for being 'strange'.4/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSxKq0eYKJm4AM4 by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:41:21Z
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@meejah @cjd Also an education issue - very few agricultural colleges teach anything but input intensive, industrialised farming. If you're a young want-to-be farmer, its highly likely thats what you'll be taughtSo I feel the issue has less to do with government intervention & more to do with Big Ags dominance of everything agriculturalI don't think government getting out the way would necessarily help. Theres massive power imbalances in the sector that somehow need addressing 5/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSxiaaLYFVRB8NM by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T12:52:30Z
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@meejah @cjd This power imbalance becomes clearer when you see where the money is made. Many farmers struggle. The profits are made elsewhere.The European Union pours massive amounts of subsidies into the farming sector (38% of total EU budget in 2018) USA and others have similar levels of support.This is considered necessary to stop farms collapsing, against competition from countries with far lower production costs (think farmworker labour). It however massively disadvantages 6/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSyGcXom1Cz6JQ8 by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T13:10:18Z
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@meejah @cjd farmers from other countries as US/EU etc. produce is dumped onto foreign markets at rock bottom prices. A bad season can see many farmers go bust, the land is bought up by bigger, better financed farmers (or farming interests from other countries). Cue greater adoption of industrialised methods...so I think the problem isn't 'distorted free markets' but rather (like many/most things) massive power inequalities within the farming / food system. Some of which is due to freedom 7/?
(DIR) Post #A1rZSyZ3RHWE89j29Y by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-04T13:22:35Z
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@meejah @cjd that large dominant companies have to push their products - via Gov lobbying, Aid, Research, Education etc. etc.They dominate because 'free markets' are incapable of pricing in damaging externalities (societal damage, huge enviro damage etc.)Offering small farmers micro-credit (haven't the benefits of that been debunked?) won't address these huge inequalities. Government interventions could address these power inequalities - although I'm currently not holding my breath 8/8
(DIR) Post #A1rZSysuFTOl7j0t60 by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T15:40:35Z
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@dazinism @meejah Free markets are indeed incapable of pricing externalities, but nobody's really trying to do "free market", every society seeks to use law and regulation to keep profit-motive "on the tracks" and benefiting society.Of course it doesn't always work, and this is a really good example: When an industry becomes powerful enough to be able to effectively lobby for subsidies & protection, it transforms into what is, in a sense, a racket, and all other activity becomes secondary.
(DIR) Post #A1rZSzCl3fHI7IIk2S by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T15:53:10Z
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@dazinism @meejah When corn farmers (for instance) are able to muster enough lobbying power to get state subsidies, they cease to be, primarily, corn farmers. Why do they still grow corn rather than sitting on their bottoms and collecting the subsidies? Price of group membership. If there's only so much subsidy to go around, they can't have Joe Schmoe applying for a grant that they fought for. They need a test that they'll all pass but Joe won't - such as owning land and growing corn.
(DIR) Post #A1rZSzarc2YnK3Zzc0 by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-04T16:15:59Z
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@dazinism @meejah I really appreciate your observations from the Ag sector, I wasn't really aware of a lot of these things but from my mental model they make total sense.Re micro-credit, credit itself is probably the wrong instrument, in Massachusetts they have something called CSAs ("community sustaining agriculture") where people buy future-shares of crop yields which spreads out the risk.But in any case, the lobby/subsidy issue is sadly not "just a financial engineering problem".
(DIR) Post #A1vw80d7dgVU29RHY8 by Capheind@mastodon.sdf.org
2020-12-04T23:43:21Z
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@dazinism @cjd @meejah that dataset doesn't seem to distinguish between land owned and land cultivated.
(DIR) Post #A1vw84ACV9kUzbwF1c by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-05T17:08:33Z
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@CapheindGuess it was enough work trying to figure out who cultivated what?Working out who owns what land is a whole different set of workeg. Here in the England the government does not have records of who owns 17% of the landTheres been some independent attempts to begin to work that out. The most recent https://whoownsengland.org @cjd @meejah
(DIR) Post #A1vw84Mbl1fpc5k9Me by Capheind@mastodon.sdf.org
2020-12-05T17:53:07Z
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@dazinism @cjd @meejah ok, but that data doesn't speak to farming methods at all, only scale.
(DIR) Post #A1vw84YJ3X20CNDUbA by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-06T01:26:39Z
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@CapheindNot directly, no.But most mid - large farms use high input industrialised farming methods and small or subsistence farms are a mixture.There is the start of a shift to broad acre regenerative farming, particularly for grass fed beef production. But I think the amount is likely globally pretty insignificant & I imagine they are producing much less beef/acre than intensive beef farms, even when including the acreage of the soy they are fed @cjd @meejah
(DIR) Post #A1vw85AalBek7784H2 by Capheind@mastodon.sdf.org
2020-12-06T01:47:16Z
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@dazinism @cjd @meejah depends on where your talking about. That is completely untrue in most of north america where many small farms are part of a large collective or co-op (like blue diamond). The main reason you see higher production is because small farms dont have the same economic incentives to leave land uncultivated. Here in California 1/3rd of ag land just sits unused because selling would create competition.
(DIR) Post #A1vw87OqTAFJ1toTlg by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-06T15:20:37Z
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@CapheindAh well, if that's the problem then the solution is simple. Land value tax them so they can pay to block competition....@dazinism @meejah
(DIR) Post #A1vw8ACC4euNhWuuxs by Capheind@mastodon.sdf.org
2020-12-06T16:30:47Z
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@cjd @dazinism @meejah we tax the land now. Progressive taxes might work, but good luck getting that passed in a Neoliberal country. Im less worried about landowners and more worried about the labor. Id much rather see more worker owned collectives.
(DIR) Post #A1vw8FSKW5mq11VNJI by cjd@mastodon.social
2020-12-06T19:00:25Z
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@Capheind @dazinism @meejah LVT is one of my personal political opinions. I believe that it should not be possible for someone to draw profit off of the economy without contributing anything because they are able to sit on land (or other "sure thing" investments).
(DIR) Post #A20QPDuXHxrZP5Y3dY by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-08T11:00:33Z
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@Capheind The report looked at a world scale. I mentioned it in regards to level of automation. Mid - large farms have better access to funds to automate. There will be some small farms with similar levels of automation. But also many withoutInteresting about crops lands in California being unused. In the EU under the Common Agriculture Policy (subsidies framework - like the US Farm Bill) to reduce overproduction farmers were paid for having a % of their land 'set aside' 1/? @cjd @meejah
(DIR) Post #A20QPE3Ol0x5qZh8S0 by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-08T11:10:22Z
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@Capheindthis changed some years back as payment of subsidies was moved from being based on production to the size of the holding, with some dependant on environmental stewardship measures.I wonder if its the subsidies that effect land use in California?If I had to guess I'd think it'd be unlikely that all the farmers would @cjd @meejah @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A20QPEBuFNl2GxfviC by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-08T11:22:43Z
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@Capheindvoluntarily collude to limit production (how would this be organised and enforced) when as an individual farm they're most likely to do better by producing more.I appreciate California is unusual in its productiveness and appreciate I may be wrong and theres some sector wide agreements to limit production.Find it hard to imagine the very short term focus on profit I see from farmers in the UK (also in other business sectors), wouldnt be replicated there. @cjd @meejah @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A20QPEOfTvxwuXe7bU by Capheind@mastodon.sdf.org
2020-12-08T11:35:17Z
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@dazinism @cjd @meejah ... farmers do collude to limit production or destroy it for market reasons, they collude with governments. They're called "agricultural price support programs" and they happen all over the world. Paying farmers to leave land fallow, or plow under crops prior to harvest, even buying produce and destroying it.
(DIR) Post #A20QPEZep4kxScmtjU by meejah@mastodon.social
2020-12-08T19:04:05Z
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@Capheind @dazinism @cjd In Canada, that "collusion" has traditionally been enforced. The Canadian Wheat Board and dairy quotas are two I'm somewhat familiar with. The net effect of the dairy quotas is a certain amount of over-production (because if you go below your quota "too long" you lose it) but I believe much less so than American milk. Wheat Board collectively bought Canadian grain and (collectively) demanded higher prices internationally. I didn't follow how well this worked...
(DIR) Post #A20QPEm44wgI56ao4W by dazinism@social.coop
2020-12-08T20:49:50Z
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@meejahThe EU has moved away from quotas and paying farmers to leave fields fallow, to having a guaranteed price and buying up crops if the market price falls below thisThey use this as 'tactical reserves' - eg. they sold all their wheat reserves one year when harvests were poor for many, yet Russia had much and was demanding high prices. Cashing in, and influencing international markets all in one grand swoopImagine most countries buy up crops and have the commodity 1/? @Capheind @cjd
(DIR) Post #A20QPEuvXzloWajssy by meejah@mastodon.social
2020-12-08T22:42:42Z
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@dazinism @Capheind @cjd That "guaranteed price and buying up crops if the market price falls below this" soudns just like what the Canadian Wheat Board did.
(DIR) Post #A20QPF3R2MZkwyig9A by msh@coales.co
2020-12-08T23:02:45Z
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@meejah the CWB didnt exactly work that way. It was a mandatory "single desk buyer" for all grain in MB, SK, AB and the peace region of BC (the part of BC in the Mountain time zone?). They bought *all* the crops at a set price regardless of market conditions on delivery, but then in August would get an additional payment as long as the price the CWB got reselling it was higher than the initial price...@dazinism @Capheind @cjd
(DIR) Post #A20R7SAddHzYN4AdQ8 by msh@coales.co
2020-12-08T23:10:39Z
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@meejah ...CWB was not universally supported, especially in AB and MB, where farmers near borders were very resentful that at least as often as not BC and ON farmers (which were exempt) got better prices selling outside CWB, and prairie farmers could not do so under penalty of imprisonment.There was also criticism that CWB impeded the ability of farmers to make and sell "value added goods" like specialty pastas and breads. It tended to encourage selling to Big Food.@dazinism @Capheind @cjd
(DIR) Post #A38PD1RejFCuVIaHVQ by dynamic@cybre.space
2021-01-11T14:52:26Z
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@cjd @Capheind @dazinism @meejah Regarding Land Value Tax, it should probably be noted that in North America, European colonizers intentionally set up incentives to make it impossible for people practicing indigenous lower-impact land management practices to continue to hold land.In _The Mindful Carnivore_, Tovar Cerulli cites historian Daniel Justin Herman as having noted that these policies were based not only in the desire to prevent the native peoples from holding land but also the goal of keeping white colonizers from choosing subsistence lifestyles.It is not an accident that it is nearly economically impossible to maintain a farms at an appropriate scale for local subsistence. There are continual pressures to scale up.Taxing land means that people need to participate in capitalism in order to hold land at all.
(DIR) Post #A38PD2pnYy74oSt4m8 by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T17:10:47Z
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@dynamic @Capheind @dazinism @meejah This argument sounds good on it's face, but I find it weak in modern day.What you're basically saying is that LVT makes it impossible to live entirely off-grid, make your own tools from stone and wood and never touch money. But this lifestyle, while romantic, is brutally difficult and nobody really does this. Even the Amish "participate in capitalism" even though they do strictly control how their community interacts with wider society.
(DIR) Post #A38PD4u7rqlNESvYnY by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T17:13:25Z
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@dynamic @Capheind @dazinism @meejah And for everyone who didn't inherit land from their family, there is already no way to do subsistence farming because land is so exorbitantly expensive.It's expensive because it's a "guaranteed investment", you just buy a bunch of land and sit back on your butt and be a landlord and you get to extract value from the economy without actually doing anything.
(DIR) Post #A391nseMBjV4COWkuu by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T17:53:33Z
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@cjd I don't think that's strictly true in Canada, at least. You'll be living somewhere "out of the way" but I think it's absolutely possible to find enough land for subsistence farming that is "cheap enough" .. of course this won't be very near any major city or town, but ... Still, your point about "getting into farming is hard (from money perspective)" stands here too.@dynamic @Capheind @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A391nsuJEQGCzrzUmW by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T18:06:44Z
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@meejah @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism Be that as it may, if there was an LVT, then land would necessarily become cheaper because unused land would be a liability rather than an asset. Also LVT is based on the land *value* and land that is far from any major city will have a lower value and so command lower LVT.Finally, the amount of money that could be raised by LVT would be so big that it could reasonably fund a basic income, so rural homesteaders could actually turn out net positive.
(DIR) Post #A391nt9uIQjlmFHx5s by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T18:07:48Z
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@cjd I haven't read enough about Land Value Tax to have a useful opinion about it .. so perhaps I should change that :) @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A391ntPVMRDKYcaPPE by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T18:09:00Z
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@meejah @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism It's pretty simple: You estimate the value of the land (minus buildings) and you tax a % of that. Really what this does is breaks the landlord juggernaut.
(DIR) Post #A391ntnFw8DFkHhNQW by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T18:25:16Z
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@cjd That sounds very, very ripe for .. cheating (at least). What is the "value" of blank land? Value for whom? (e.g. "wild lands" have value for everyone who DOESN'T own it; value for the "owner" is often in destroying it: logging, etc)We kind-of do that for property taxes in my city: the thing you're taxed on is the estimated/assessed value of the property (not, e.g., its last sale price or anything). But this has big holes and lots of problems, IMO.@dynamic @Capheind @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A391nu4ysEOIdFzX3Q by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T18:32:48Z
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@meejah @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism Do you think these issues are a greater burden on society than the landlord class which is created by the current system ?
(DIR) Post #A391nuH29Q23Edd9qC by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T19:44:28Z
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@cjd I don't see how this changes anything meaningful in that sense. (My city still has "landlords" and "renters" despite using what sounds very similar to a "land value tax"?) @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A391nuSNTF6dnowDWS by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T19:49:37Z
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@meejah @dynamic @Capheind @dazinism People will always pay a premium to live in "good neighborhoods" i.e. places where everyone who lives there is able to pay a premium. Don't fight human nature. The difference with LVT is that the premium funds the state rather than funding the idle rich.
(DIR) Post #A391numEHQzAnOE4Su by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T19:53:12Z
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@cjd In broad strokes, what that means in my city is that the "inner city" funds the "exurbs" and so we have massive sprawl, essentially funded by those "desirable" areas. Unsurprisingly, this is "just" because developers have been exploiting this dynamic (building cheap suburbs that end up costing "the city" more in the long run: more services, bigger sprawl, more driving, unhealthy living patterns).I'm not sure that a change of tax-structure is sufficient here.@dynamic @Capheind @dazinism
(DIR) Post #A391nvC6jDga5eKjnk by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T19:58:45Z
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@cjd Maybe the "opposite" way is more fruitful: how does LVT eliminate the landlord? Why wouldn't they just (e.g.) increase rents as with any other expense?
(DIR) Post #A391nvSPkajIuDxlDc by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T20:05:32Z
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@meejah It doesn't eliminate them entirely, what it does is cause landlording to be far less profitable because (say) 80% of their profit is now going to the state. The whole sequence of things which will happen is kind of complicated, but you can analyze it pretty easily by seeing that fewer people sitting on their butts making money means more for everyone else.
(DIR) Post #A391nvdP5jWJSJ6XLc by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T20:10:28Z
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@meejah The real sequence of events should look something like:1. Houses stop being so profitable2. Landlords and "flippers" start dumping their "investment houses"3. Housing bubble bursts -- this is one reason why LVT is politically difficult4. Housing more available for more people, more homeowners5. Rent prices collapse, LVT decreases6. New startup landlords who are setup to operate on smaller marginsMore needs to be done but LVT is definitely correcting an political/economic error.
(DIR) Post #A391nvwBxsY6OZtXdI by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-11T21:37:43Z
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@cjd Landlords and "flippers" aren't sitting on their asses, though. Landlords are doing things like maintenance, yard-work, etc. "Flippers" are doing a bunch of physical work to a house (e.g. renovations). I'm certainly willing to agree that they may be able to make "too much" profit off these activities, but I don't think it's fair to say they're doing nothing at all. There's also financing (which is maybe what you meant?) where bankers essentially siphon a bunch of money away ...
(DIR) Post #A391nw7tGNuGyrMsro by cy@fedicy.allowed.org
2021-01-12T00:31:37.098404Z
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@meejah @cjd “investment houses” are specifically the houses with no one living in them, that are purely reserved for the owner’s investment purposes. There’s pretty much no defending that. Maintenance and yard-work on a house that nobody lives in is about as ostentatious as having a private garden of hedge sculptures outside your oceanfront mansion estate.Well, I mean the “defense” is that we allow them to screw us over, by not demonetizing real estate. So who can blame them for ripping us off, when we’re letting them walk all over us? But that’s just another argument for demonetizing real estate.
(DIR) Post #A393R2M88RdJY8ElHM by ned@noagendasocial.com
2021-01-12T00:49:56Z
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@cy @cjd @meejah I own an investment house. I earn $70k a year and support a family of 4. I loose money every year on my investment property every year because the income from rent is less than loan repayments and maintenance. I accept the risk so that my children will have a house that they own.
(DIR) Post #A393abYicX3LKtggjI by ned@noagendasocial.com
2021-01-12T00:51:41Z
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@cy @cjd @meejah I own an investment house. I earn $70kAUD a year (about $45kUSD) and support a family of 4. I lose money every year on my investment property because the income from rent is less than loan repayments and maintenance. I accept the risk so that my children will have a house that they own.
(DIR) Post #A393dRZWD0GjELPoPY by ned@noagendasocial.com
2021-01-12T00:52:12Z
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@cy @cjd @meejah I own an investment house. I earn $70kAUD a year (about $54kUSD) and support a family of 4. I lose money every year on my investment property because the income from rent is less than loan repayments and maintenance. I accept the risk so that my children will have a house that they own.
(DIR) Post #A3AcryzCSmoKTF3W5I by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-12T02:29:45Z
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@cy @cjd Okay, maybe we're all using English, but using it slightly differently ;)Definitely a "dead" house like that is an obvious problem. I was thinking more about "normal" rental properties (where the person that owns them doesn't live there, but is still providing "a service" of sorts). Definitely there are plenty of examples of that being bad -- but there are also lots of examples of capitalists "being bad" in other ways too ("rent too high" is just another way to say "profit too much")
(DIR) Post #A3AcrzFrSq8dIuqp3Q by cy@fedicy.allowed.org
2021-01-12T19:01:42.859710Z
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@meejah @cjd I guess what I’m saying is, all other things equal, you wouldn’t let someone take your house, just because they were willing to do yard work on it, unless you were renting. It’s one of those fundamentally unfair situations, which people agree to out of convenience and necessity, but end up increasing inequality overall. No matter how hard working and honorable a person they may be, very few landlords are tenants. I’m not sure it needs to be eliminated entirely, but land ownership is too centralized today, so we need more people owning land, and less people renting it. You’re right that the “dead house” is a symptom of only the most extreme crisis arising from this situation. Other issues with it are not nearly as black and white.
(DIR) Post #A3Apr7TIjBI5u13PMG by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-12T19:08:35Z
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@cy @cjd I'm not convinced a Land Value Tax is an incremental step towards the elimination of real property (which I believe overall would be good itself).All I'm really saying here is that not all landlords are fundamentally bad; that they provide a service at least some people want; and that this aspect would I think remain. For example, some people like to be able to move easily or go away for long-ish periods -- "caring for the house" aspects of renting can make that way easier.
(DIR) Post #A3Apr7hTsSdKbzgjSa by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-12T19:25:16Z
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@meejah @cy Well if your objective is to eliminate real property entirely then making all owners into lessees who lease their property from the state is in effect the same thing as an LVT.We should be able to imagine that there is a point at which the LVT becomes so high that a piece of land is abandoned. Working back from that point, the land-holder will exploit it as much as possible (expecting to sell or abandon it soon), as LVT decreases the level of stewardship increases.
(DIR) Post #A3Apr7w10QG9L4UL7A by cy@fedicy.allowed.org
2021-01-12T21:27:11.683980Z
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@cjd @meejah The objective is to stop making property worth money. Real estate cannot be exchanged for money, because they are not the same thing. It does not work. I can claim land, then sell it for money, and you’ll act like I didn’t just hold a gun to your head and rob you of $100,000. Trying to crowbar in terrible laws, turning non-commodities into commodies, forcing non-markets to be markets, that is what makes a piece of land abandoned. People forced to abandon it, because the law demands they obey the market, which demands they obey the cost of real estate. Which is always too high. LVT doesn’t matter. It’s the commoditization that needs to stop.
(DIR) Post #A3B61TWFD1i8RaOGyO by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-12T23:09:14Z
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@cjd Deliberately responding to a "higher" message in this thread and dropping the others off because it's old and long (though extremely interesting).On the topic of LVT or any other form of property tax, I think people underestimate the extent to which inflation and artificially low interest rates subsidize the holding of unproductive land, or any other unproductive asset. The Fed hasn't kept inflation low; policy just funnels most inflation into assets. Fix that and you may not need a LVT.
(DIR) Post #A3B61TnGBlK1IMLrUm by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-13T00:19:55Z
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@freakazoid Credit is definitely a big part of the cycle, but the way it's been told to me is that the central banks ease money to avoid deflation and help the economy, then the local banks decide where to lend and they have to pick between a restaurant with a 60% failure probability and a McMansion which even if it's ugly as sin has a 95% chance of going up in value just because it's in a trendy neighborhood. So they obviously choose the latter.
(DIR) Post #A3B61U6P2adOFjJ9Ki by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T00:27:25Z
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@cjd A big part of what caused the 2008 meltdown is that the system has become addicted to home values going up, because the default rate (and thus risk to the bank) of a mortgage is essentially zero. Worst case they evict and sell the place at auction for a profit.This is not sustainable, but there is every incentive for the people in power to keep it going, so I don't see it changing without a much bigger meltdown than 2008.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSXrZri4nPmDwxM by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-13T00:28:50Z
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@freakazoid I totally agree. My thinking is that if land value had a slow and steady inflation similar to cash, then banks would have to pick the best restaurant to lend to rather than parking all of their capital in mortgages (or they'd just go land to crypto speculators). In my thinking, LVT is essentially that, except rather than the land losing value inherently, you pay for the privilege of controlling it.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSY4h4wZI4SMQOu by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T00:39:02Z
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@cjd Prior to the creation of the Fed and Fannie Mae, real estate was considered a risky investment. Which was fine, because people's homes didn't used to be nearly as big a fraction of their net worth. Mortgages used to only go to 20 years.Nowadays, banks don't even hold onto most mortgages. They make their money originating the loan and then immediately sell it to the government, which gives them little incentive to care whether you can pay or if the house gains or loses value.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSYGkM8D2fq03Bg by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:04:22Z
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@cjd Incidentally, a higher interest rate doesn't only increase the cost of holding unproductive land by reducing asset inflation. Holding an asset must be weighed against the return on any investment of equivalent risk. So a 5% interest rate is equivalent to a 5% property tax to an investor, because you could make 5% by sticking the money in bonds or CDs. And unlike a tax, it serves its function without requiring that landholders "participate in the capitalist system".
(DIR) Post #A3BDSYZXEHEpc6n3TM by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-13T01:10:43Z
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@freakazoid You raise some interesting points, I know that the housing market in European countries is not as much out of whack as it is in the US, but I'm not so well informed about what they're doing differently.Your point about government buying mortgages indeed is a good one.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSYsK6QGcYNa3l2 by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:13:32Z
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@cjd I don't know that much about housing in European countries, but I do know that at least some of them have higher home ownership rates than we do without needing to significantly subsidize home ownership. My guess is that it's some combination of a less messed up banking system and better housing/zoning/building policies.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSZ4NNbuN9lDgXo by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-13T01:16:11Z
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@freakazoid Where I live in France, everyone buys apartments rather than whole houses, and builders put up enormous apartment buildings everywhere they can find a green patch to build on. Not sure if it is subsidy-based, though I should probably guess that it is...
(DIR) Post #A3BDSZLOMLWG0XBH4C by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:19:22Z
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@cjd If home prices are stable, maybe it's not such a bad thing. Gotta house people somewhere, and high density is generally a lot better overall from an ecological standpoint.My understanding is that while Tokyo is expensive, home prices there have remained relatively stable because building policy is controlled at the national level, which avoids NIMBYism and attempts to bolster values by choking supply.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSZY9atjAe79SxU by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:25:33Z
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@cjd One thing to keep in mind about tech is that Andreesen's "software is eating the world" is still going strong, so to some extent the overall amount of investment in tech reflects this. Whether it's the right amount of investment or any given company can ever live up to its inflated valuation is another matter, and a string of disappointments will probably cause a big correction.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSZn2hXdZOI7MAK by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:33:28Z
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@cjd Google, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Amazon are no longer really innovating. I don't think Google's investment in cloud is going to pay off very well for them, and I suspect their AI investments will end up fizzling because smaller, more nimble companies will be able to bring useful products to market faster. Apple is running entirely on their momentum from Steve Jobs as far as I can tell. Facebook is facing huge turnover and VR/AR will probably move too slowly to save them.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSa3LiugICrkNaC by cjd@mastodon.social
2021-01-13T01:37:51Z
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@freakazoid You see it up close, I see it from a distance. Lindy Effect, these companies are too young to get old. Over the next 50 years, my money would be on IBM rather than any of them.
(DIR) Post #A3BDSaHAtVjwtkDQ8G by freakazoid@retro.social
2021-01-13T01:50:49Z
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@cjd Yeah I have no idea. MS and Google have built fairly robust organizations. MS has already survived their peak. Google have survived slowing down a lot, though it remains to be seen what will happen to them when they actually shrink for the first time. Facebook don't seem to be handling their slowdown particularly well, and it's far from clear to me whether their Oculus bet is going to end up working out for them.
(DIR) Post #A3BE84wvkvNVu3X5Ie by meejah@mastodon.social
2021-01-12T19:10:35Z
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@cy @cjd That said, I acknowledge that there are some very bad aspects of this -- perhaps the majority? There are of course a whole class of Corporate Landlords (holding companies, etc) that are usually very bad. Also a lot of landlord/tennant relations are pretty toxic and one-sided. So, yes, lets explore policies that would get rid of this aspect!
(DIR) Post #A3BFHW4sMaMsbGJT5E by michel_slm@floss.social
2021-01-13T02:10:43Z
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@freakazoid @cjd a lot of the "innovation" seems to involve integrating all the disparate pieces to make the company harder to break up. e.g. Oculus requiring FB logins, Messenger / Instagram Chat "interoperability"...oh, and rebranding. Oculus + Portal => AR/VR => FRL (and the old FRL is now FRL Research, even though you might think Lab implies Research)
(DIR) Post #A3Ex9EbhrdfpZzn2Fk by cy@fedicy.allowed.org
2021-01-14T21:07:46.977992Z
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@ned @cjd @meejah You wouldn’t have to worry about your children being unable to own a house, if we could demonetize real estate.Anyway don’t sell it. I’m just saying it should be a bad investment for everyone, not only people like you.
(DIR) Post #A3ExyaOgbp8TveBb0a by ned@noagendasocial.com
2021-01-14T21:17:03Z
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@cy @cjd @meejah what does "demonetizing" real estate even mean? Who decides who gets what piece of property?
(DIR) Post #A3MzMd5JvFE0QupslU by cy@fedicy.allowed.org
2021-01-18T18:10:18.305201Z
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@ned @cjd @meejah Well uh, it’s a goal more than a process, and I’m not exactly an expert on the subject. One thing I heard that can help demonetize real estate is rent control. Landlords can’t get as much money from renting properties then, and more will sell it to land owners for cheap and go somewhere else to try and make money. A lot of cities in the USA issued a moratorium on evictions in the wake of this virus, which also helps. Unfortunately it also gives landlords motivation to torture their tenants until they “voluntarily” leave, and our completely insane legislators have almost universally stated that all unpaid rent must to be repaid immediately in full WITH INTEREST after the moratorium ends. So I’m not a huge fan of this strategy.Interstate freeways going directly through the heart of most US cities will raise land prices and destroy communities, so dismantling those and building your freeways out of town almost always helps demonetize real estate.Oh, laws that persecute the homeless, like adding bars to benches, arresting people sleeping in public places, anti-camping laws, or those phony “protected wildlife ecosystem bunnies and kittens area KEEP OUT” signs, those raise the price of real estate, since people are more afraid to be homeless. This has the issue that homeless people still do better when they can form communities, and at that point you have communally controlled property also known as commu—SOCIALISM.One thing a city can do is not sell public land for pennies to crummy developers. Simply avoiding that action keeps the price of land low, and keeps crummy developers from building money machines on it (starting in the low $400 (((thousand)))’s!). Encouraging small business keeps real estate prices low, since if the big business moves in, they not only flood the local economy with cash, and take up huge tracts of real estate themselves, they bring along an army of crummy developers to build overpriced form houses to sell to their soon-to-be-arriving army of employees. Nothing gentrifies a neighborhood worse than that.There are various zoning laws that affect up the price of property, and those can be tweaked somewhat to keep it lower, if you can manage to get legislators who don’t deliberately do the opposite, so they can sell our land to the highest bidder.Oh and there’s always communism.