[HN Gopher] 'We Currently Have No Container Ships,' Seattle Port...
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'We Currently Have No Container Ships,' Seattle Port Says
Author : pseudolus
Score : 174 points
Date : 2025-05-10 15:49 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.newsweek.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.newsweek.com)
| ljf wrote:
| Looks like this needs updating now https://www.snopes.com/fact-
| check/chinese-cargo-seattle-tari...
| BJones12 wrote:
| No, the original claim was "as of April 29, 2025", which was
| false and will always be false.
|
| Perhaps they should make another page for the newest claims.
| But again, the situation is very different than this article's
| headline.
| tokai wrote:
| Seems like they are debunking that port is empty, while the
| article of this thread states that there are no container
| ships. Lots of cargo isn't moved by container ships.
| kristjansson wrote:
| > In fact, the Northwest Seaport Alliance ... said it was so
| far seeing more vessels call into port in 2025 than in 2024,
| with three more calls in the first quarter of 2025 than during
| the same period in 2024.
|
| > However, the ships calling into port were arriving with
| unpredictable volumes of cargo -- sometimes 30% less than
| anticipated
|
| And Snopes felt comfortable rating "mostly false" to the top
| level claim? I get that they're trying to navigating
| treacherous waters, but "there's still ships, they're just 1/3
| empty" is as much support for the top level claim as it is
| contradiction
| echoangle wrote:
| Not really, the claim was ,,the port is empty", not ,,the
| ships arriving are empty". If there are still ships arriving,
| the claim is false.
| kristjansson wrote:
| Most of what comprises a port is infrastructure for
| handling containers and bulk cargo. If cargo volumes are
| down, some fraction of that infrastructure is disused, or
| used below its capacity. That a ship was at berth is cold
| comfort to the longshoremen, truck drivers, etc. who
| expected to work that cargo, nevermind to the people that
| expected to, y'know, purchase and consume those goods.
|
| Is 30% underutilized / partially disused tantamount to
| empty? Maybe not. But it's in the ballpark in a way the
| snopes rating undersells.
| lurk2 wrote:
| > But it's in the ballpark
|
| It is not remotely in the ballpark. The word "empty" is
| not understood to mean "70% full" anywhere in the
| English-speaking world.
| michaelt wrote:
| There are websites that provide tracking for a lot of
| ships.
|
| For comparison here's Tilbury, near London in the UK:
| https://www.vesselfinder.com/?p=GBTIL001 you'll note that
| big cargo vessels are shown in yellow.
|
| And here's the port of Seattle:
| https://www.vesselfinder.com/?p=USSEA001 You'll note a
| distinct lack of yellow. If you zoom out a bit you can
| find some 'bulk carriers' but those aren't container
| ships.
|
| So when the article quotes the Seattle port commissioner
| who says "we currently have no container ships at berth"
| that might be literally true right now at that specific
| port.
|
| Other US ports seem to be doing better - Perhaps Seattle
| is badly located or expensive, and has taken a
| disproportionate fraction of the 30% drop in volumes?
| There are certainly larger ports on the same coast https:
| //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Top_container_ports_...
| HotHotLava wrote:
| That's why it's just "mostly" false, but 'empty' is a
| word with a specific meaning, and claim here was that the
| port is literally empty of ships. (or, in the case of the
| Twitter message they show, that there's only one single
| ship in the harbor)
| watwut wrote:
| The claim was "at this moment right now, the port is
| empty". The article then talks about 35% drop of
| "shipments" and "imports".
| lowbloodsugar wrote:
| Snopes has been pwnd. It now adheres to the standard of
| literal truth with a political bias. So if someone posts
| "Bernie Sanders has 30,000 at a rally" (true) but the image
| is of a different (also true) rally but on a different date,
| then Snopes just says "it's false". Not "true, but the image
| is wrong". Not informative, like "Bernie did have 30,000
| people attend but this image is from XYZ". Just says FALSE!
| Same here.
| mikem170 wrote:
| They've always seemed informative and do a good job of
| showing their sources. How big a deal is the single-word
| true/false judgement for an ambiguous claim if all the
| relevant details are summarized?
| mtillman wrote:
| Perfect use of treacherous waters. Kudos.
| lurk2 wrote:
| If I drink 30% of a glass of water, is the glass of water
| empty?
| plopz wrote:
| its closer to empty than before you drank
| Retric wrote:
| These aren't static systems.
|
| Keep removing 1 cup of water and add 2/3 cups and
| eventually it goes to zero. For a port that very well may
| be sending people home early on an 'empty' port. Even if
| tomorrow brings in new ships for now it looks like a ghost
| town.
|
| And then at one port on one day zero cargo ships showed up.
| lurk2 wrote:
| > These aren't static systems.
|
| That is irrelevant.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| No, but if the claim is that the glass no longer has any
| boba it's irrelevant how much liquid you drink.
|
| The specific claim was that the port no longer had any
| container ships on that specific day. And that claim was
| true.
|
| Yes, there were other ships in the port. But that's
| irrelevant. A container ship is a specific kind of cargo
| ship used for international cargo shipments. In an article
| about international shipments, that distinctions matters.
| ok_dad wrote:
| If I drink 30% less water overall, I'd be pretty unhealthy.
| lurk2 wrote:
| That is irrelevant. The question was weather or not the
| ports can be considered empty if some ships are up to 30%
| empty, which is not the case. Emptiness can be more
| encompassing than 0% (there is still some residual water
| in an "empty" glass of water), but it isn't so expansive
| as to range from >0% to 70%.
| ok_dad wrote:
| You're speaking about technicalities. There shouldn't be
| any argument that our economy will continue to be fucked
| by tariffs and supply issues. 30 percent is massive.
| noworriesnate wrote:
| "Technicalities?" 70% does not round to 0%. That's not a
| "technicality," that is a blatant misrepresentation.
|
| If a boy was watching the sheep, saw a wolf, and cried
| "Dragon! Dragon!" and then the king and his army came to
| fight the dragon, and when he was criticized for lying,
| he said, "You're talking in technicalities, there was
| indeed a wolf," that is what this feels like to me. But
| then if he refused to ever call the wolf a wolf, and this
| happened over and over again, and he always called it a
| dragon--well, a lot of people would just ignore him.
|
| Like, why not just say "Yeah, it's not true. Not sure
| what this guy's agenda is, but easily-disproved
| exaggeration doesn't help make the case. There IS a
| problem though, and let's try to have that conversation
| while ignoring obvious alarmism." You would sound
| reasonable and mature, and possibly even convincing.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Not the first time their headline has been at odds with their
| content. I've never really been a fan of this particular
| outlet, even in their early days I found their self-absorbed
| writing style insufferable. They strike me as pedantic rather
| than informative.
| danesparza wrote:
| The slopes article was about a claim in April.
|
| This article was written in May, and directly quotes Seattle
| port commissioner Ryan Calkins.
| TheBozzCL wrote:
| Absolutely off-topic, but I started browsing Snopes' tracking
| consent options and they use an insane amount of vendors. It
| took me longer to scroll through the list than reading the
| article itself.
| snozolli wrote:
| I find it odd that recent articles are always about the Port of
| Seattle. From a quick Google search, it looks like the busiest US
| ports are Los Angeles, Long Beach, Port of New York, Port of
| Savannah, _then_ Port of Seattle. As of 2018, the Port of Los
| Angeles alone was almost 3x busier than the Port of Seattle.
|
| Not that it isn't worth noting, but I'm much more interested in
| overall volume across all of the nation's ports, and especially
| the West Coast ports.
| tokai wrote:
| I don't follow you. You can find numerous articles about cargo
| rates falling for those ports as well.
| snozolli wrote:
| _I don 't follow you_
|
| What's not to follow? Numerous articles have been published
| with sensational headlines like "the Port of Seattle is
| empty". It's the smallest port on the West Coast.
|
| As others have posted, LA is down 35%. That's useful
| information, not "this much smaller port is empty!"
| marcosdumay wrote:
| I have been looking for an explanation to the US empty ports
| news. The best one I came with is that ships have been
| switching their destination ports to some that they could reach
| before the tariffs or some that have available tariff-free
| storage where the cargo can stay until Trump backpedals.
|
| The total cargo volume seems to be falling only now, what still
| may be just noise.
| foobarian wrote:
| Right, be interesting to see if the departure volume also
| dropped or how long it lags behind arrivals.
| gamblor956 wrote:
| The simple explanation is that many (but not all) exporters
| simply stopped exporting things in April (as those shipments
| would have arrived in May, after the tariffs took effect).
| And many of the factories overseas have cut back on
| production, especially of low-value goods most affected by
| tariffs. Smaller ports like Seattle generally handle the
| overflow from the bigger ports, so they're the first to be
| affected by the reduction in cargo traffic.
|
| Even if tariffs are reduced/eliminated, there will still be a
| lag of 3-6 weeks before destination-port cargo traffic picks
| up again, _assuming_ that there is product overseas ready to
| be shipped.
| Cerium wrote:
| My understanding is that ship tarrifs are calculated at the
| time of departure, not arrival. This supports the delayed
| volume reduction since we see the change 22 to 40 days
| delayed (Pacific transit time).
| roxolotl wrote:
| These in particular are calculated based on time of
| departure. I don't believe that's the common case though.
| kristjansson wrote:
| LA is down 32% YoY this week[0].
|
| But also LA and Long Beach are effectively a single port, so
| per your enumeration ... Seattle is the second biggest port on
| the west coast? Seems like that'd be one to look at when we're
| talking about transpacific trade?
|
| [0]: https://volumes.portoptimizer.com/ . NB The predictions
| for subsequent weeks are based on historical data AFAICT, and
| haven't been accurate. The actual are good data though.
| snozolli wrote:
| _But also LA and Long Beach are effectively a single port, so
| per your enumeration ... Seattle is the second biggest port
| on the west coast?_
|
| Long Beach has almost the traffic as Los Angeles, so by your
| logic Seattle is only 1/6 the volume.
|
| _Seems like that'd be one to look at when we're talking
| about transpacific trade?_
|
| Which one? I would be looking at LA and LB.
| kristjansson wrote:
| I didn't say it was a close second.
|
| Again, LA/LB are basically the same port. One would also
| want to look at the next biggest geographically distinct
| port, which on the west coast is Seattle
| foota wrote:
| Might be because more southern ports handle a wider variety of
| cargo origins (e.g., South America), whereas most cargo to
| Seattle is from China? Just speculation.
| firesteelrain wrote:
| Savannah is one of the busiest container ports in the United
| States. China is the largest trading partner. Other countries
| are Vietnam, South Korea, India, Japan, Germany, UK,
| Netherlands, Italy, France, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile,
| Argentina, Canada, Turkey, Indonesia, and Thailand. Pretty
| much year to year, TEU has been steadily increasing not
| decreasing. March was up over the previous year despite
| tariff threats back then.
|
| https://gaports.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/Monthly-
| TEU-T...
|
| Still don't have updated data for April and May published.
| ljf wrote:
| https://www.npr.org/2025/05/07/nx-s1-5389955/los-angeles-por...
|
| LA Port is down 35 percent so far.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| IIRC there was some speculation that a dip in container volumes
| would lead to less calls at smaller ports since there would be
| more room available at larger ports, and reducing port calls
| both reduces fees and travel times.
| huhkerrf wrote:
| Not that it invalidates your point, but you're missing a lot of
| ports. Houston, South Louisiana, Mobile, Beaumont, etc. Seattle
| is actually 17th by foreign import tonnage.
| firesteelrain wrote:
| This shows port traffic increasing by 56% when compared to the
| prior year for the time period of May 18-24 based on the number
| of scheduled vessels and twenty foot equivalent unit (TEU).
| What's really going on if tariffs were having a major
| detrimental impact?
| 9283409232 wrote:
| The uptick can be explained by this story[0]. As trade talks
| begin, exporters want to be ready to begin shipping ASAP. It
| remains to be seen if this will volume will come through
| depending on the results of these trade talks and tariffs.
|
| [0] https://gcaptain.com/as-trade-talks-begin-chinese-
| exporters-...
| joezydeco wrote:
| Friend of mine is in the commercial real estate business,
| leases lots of warehouses to big names. He says he's seeing a
| LOT of uptake on the east coast: Savannah, Jacksonville FL,
| Charleston.
|
| A lot of companies are shifting to production in India,
| Pakistan, Vietnam, and it's easier to ship through Suez to the
| east coast from there.
| guywithahat wrote:
| I was thinking that too; I'm guessing the Seattle port was
| posted just because Seattle is a tech hub and people recognize
| the city.
|
| I'm sure imports will be down though, as that's the point of
| the tariffs
| BJones12 wrote:
| As is tradition, I'll plug the latest episode of What's Going On
| With Shipping:
|
| https://youtu.be/QCyB-Ym0ryk?t=947
|
| (the timestamp links to the "May 2025 Estimate" chapter)
| cableshaft wrote:
| Youtube just suggested that to me recently and it's quite an
| interesting channel with lots of charts and data if you're
| curious about this stuff.
| mmazing wrote:
| Yeah, it is a far better source of information than literally
| anywhere else I have seen for getting commentary on the
| tariff's actual impact on trade.
| neuroelectron wrote:
| This article first published 2 days ago. Here's one from April
| 30: https://www.fox13seattle.com/news/rumors-claim-seattle-
| ports... April 29:
| https://www.king5.com/article/news/verify/what-we-can-verify...
| April 28: https://seemorerocks.substack.com/p/port-of-seattle-
| empty-ze... April 27: https://mishtalk.com/economics/shipping-
| collapse-port-worker... April 25:
| https://www.seattletimes.com/business/tariff-tit-for-tat-has...
|
| Seattle/Tacoma Seaport schedule:
| https://www.nwseaportalliance.com/cargo-operations/vessel-sc...
|
| This article from Dec, '24 says port volume is expected to be
| lower than pandemic levels until 2029. A lot of chatter around
| the issue centers on local politics and leaders:
| https://www.postalley.org/2024/12/26/seattles-port-faces-a-c...
| m3047 wrote:
| A chunk of the Post Alley article is spent on the observation
| that a single stevedoring company controls operations at all
| terminals in Seattle, but not in Tacoma; yet they're both part
| of the same port alliance.
| mattskr wrote:
| I've been watching What's Going on With Shipping
| (https://www.youtube.com/@wgowshipping). He's a professor and a
| former merchant mariner. More importantly, he's super sober about
| the facts of the situation and frankly has a better overall
| understanding of logistics than a random journalist. I'm tired of
| the sensationalism of every damn thing, and at least this guy's
| channel gives a more realistic perspective.
|
| Highly recommend watching his stuff if "shipping" is your new
| sudden "expertise" because it's the hot new thing the media cycle
| wants you to focus on.
| danesparza wrote:
| I've been watching that channel, too. Good stuff.
|
| But calling this "a random journalist" when the article
| directly quotes Seattle port commissioner Ryan Calkins is
| minimizing the truth.
|
| From the article:
|
| _" I can see it right over my shoulder here, I'm looking out
| at the Port of Seattle right now, and we currently have no
| container ships at berth," Seattle port commissioner Ryan
| Calkins told CNN on Wednesday.
|
| "That happens every once in a while at normal times, but it's
| pretty rare," he added. "And so to see it tonight is I think a
| stark reminder that the impacts of the tariffs have real
| implications."_
| firesteelrain wrote:
| _" That happens every once in a while..."_
|
| Are we looking at this moment as one of those times? It
| sounds like he is unsure if it is truly tariff impacts or not
| if he has seen it before.
| refulgentis wrote:
| Idk the whole discussion is hard for me to parse.
|
| - Any one-off data point could be just random decrease or
| tariff impacts and we do not have a forward-looking time
| machine to accumulate more data
|
| - It doesn't really shed any light at all if volumes are
| less or more: both outcomes can be spun as a success (if
| they're less, great, American Juche continues unimpeded, if
| they're more, great, then we just debate if the
| manufacturers ("China") are "paying for" the tariffs by
| decreasing list prices to the importer enough that the
| importer can maintain the same price for customers)
| ("China" cannot literally pay for the tariffs, they are
| paid for by the US company or individual accepting the
| shipment from the dock)
|
| It's sort of like if it was February 2020, Wuhan was
| overrun and Italy was exploding, and people spent a lot of
| time in the nuances of if the US double digit case was up
| more this week than it was last week or two weeks ago
| firesteelrain wrote:
| Spot on. Micro-analyzing week-to-week data in a system
| with lags, noise, and strategic behavior doesn't help.
|
| People crave conclusions with early, messy data.
| habinero wrote:
| I think it's pretty self-apparent? He's saying it
| occasionally happens but it's rare and the fact that it's
| happening now is a concerning data point.
|
| It's like climate change: sure, historically you naturally
| get years with lots of hurricanes or really strong ones.
|
| But if you get, on average, more and more hurricanes and
| the hurricanes themselves are stronger? That's a trend.
| ncr100 wrote:
| I'm worried that Trump will use this impending crisis to enact
| some distracting and worse event for the United States.
|
| Historically he does this, use outrageous distractions to diffuse
| negative attention from his perceived failures.
| electrondood wrote:
| And then the courts are like "no, you don't get to do that."
|
| What kind of master negotiator creates a deadline that only
| applies to himself?
| 9283409232 wrote:
| Trump has been ignoring the courts. Why would he stop now?
| mmazing wrote:
| He found the loophole that courts hate!
| daemin wrote:
| Trump can afford to do that because the highest court in
| the land said anything he does as President in official
| duties he cannot be tried for.
|
| So now he doesn't care what any court says.
| perihelions wrote:
| Related thread,
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43844708 ( _" Port of Los
| Angeles says shipping volume will plummet 35% next week
| (cnbc.com)"_ -- 657 comments)
| shepherdjerred wrote:
| > "That happens every once in a while at normal times, but it's
| pretty rare,"
| banku_brougham wrote:
| Huge amount of discussion in this thread neglects the idea that a
| massive increase in tariffs will throttle trade shipments. Its
| the obvious expected effect.
| fallingknife wrote:
| That's obvious. I think the question is more one of how long
| will they be throttled for? Even if there was a domestic or
| foreign nontariffed supplier for 100% of the goods in question
| it would still take significant lead time for the new orders to
| be filled and even more for cases where capacity needs to be
| increased.
| theturtletalks wrote:
| No one knows, it's a game of chicken. Will the suppliers eat
| the tariff cost if they start losing market share? Will
| consumers just pay the extra cost if they really need the
| item?
|
| If the latter happens, will a domestic company come in and
| undercut the international sellers?
| pan69 wrote:
| If the suppliers decide that it's not worth the risk of
| letting the consumer to decide to pay the passed on tariff
| then there simply is no consumer choice.
|
| There needs to exist a domestic supplier to be able to fill
| the gap. My guess is that for many products, there simply
| isn't one.
| habinero wrote:
| Yeah, standing up a new factory will take five years and
| hundreds of millions of dollars.
|
| Larger businesses like Apple will cut deals. Smaller
| businesses will just fold.
| roxolotl wrote:
| Again further stating the obvious here but this is the
| _desired_ effect. Not saying if that's good one way or the
| other but it's clear the goal is to reduce inbound volume from
| the world.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Maybe, but no trade means no new money from tariffs and the
| plan was to confuse the market get massive short term
| windfall while slowly onshoring those jobs replacing that
| income through corporate/income tax.
|
| Now we have no trade and a drop in demand for US currency.
| notorandit wrote:
| This is what USA voters asked for.
|
| This is democracy.
| chris_wot wrote:
| I have Jack Karlson in my head "Gentlemen, this is democracy
| manifest!".
|
| Only this is not amusing.
|
| Are you feeling great yet, Americans?
| lvl155 wrote:
| Think you want to look at Vancouver traffic as well. I believe
| some companies are shipping it there and waiting it out. This
| admin will fold faster than a cheap $2...
| AlotOfReading wrote:
| I wonder how long that can last. Quite a bit of Vancouver
| traffic diverts to Seattle and Tacoma to avoid capacity issues,
| and there's finite warehouse capacity to hold containers that
| haven't gone through customs.
| hmm37 wrote:
| Isn't Trump also placing extra charges on Chinese made ships
| docking at US ports? If they ship to Vancouver, and trains ship
| the shipping containers to the US, can you avoid this extra fee
| which is quite expensive at a $1M or so per Chinese made
| container ship?
| ccorcos wrote:
| Can we talk about how many tiny/hidden x's I had to find to read
| this article?!
| watwut wrote:
| So, the headline is direct quote from what port director says. He
| The article content talks about 35 percent drop.
|
| People in this discussion here argue that article was written by
| bad lying journalist, because other sources say there is 35
| percent drop in shipment and ports rarely have empty port.
|
| Like, ok.
| hintymad wrote:
| I really hope that capitalism works this time: we bring back our
| key manufacturing. One may argue that toys are not key
| manufacturing, but I think that argument misses the point. The
| point is, a truly industrialized country can produce anything en
| mass, if needed. Without light industry, we simply can't achieve
| that. Worse, we become the Soviet Union, letting heavy industry
| break the country's back. The recent India-Pkistan conflict is a
| good example.
|
| During the India-Pakistan conflict on May 7, 2025, Pakistan
| claimed that it used a J-10C fighter jet to shoot down an Indian
| Rafale jet. The possible reasons below for the Rafale being shot
| down are quite a read. I listed some below. And I'm not sure how
| many people realized this: each J-10 sold for only 50M, while
| each Rafale sold for north of 200M. And when a dark factory in
| China churns out a thousand PL-15s a day like the US used to be
| able to do, how do we even fight that if there is indeed a war?
|
| All the technologies list below used to be the envy of China, yet
| now China can make them. They may not as good as the western, but
| good enough with cheap enough will win, right?
|
| What's even more sad is that we seemed content that we can export
| lots of agriculture products and raw materials to China. I
| thought that used to be what a colony did: Britains mandated that
| colonies couldn't produce advanced products and could only export
| raw materials. And our founding fathers fought a war so we didn't
| have to be a colonized country. Well, history is full of irony.
|
| Now some technical stuff about J-10 vs Rafale:
|
| Radar Performance Gap: The J-10C is equipped with the KLJ-7A
| active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, which uses
| gallium nitride (GaN) technology and includes over 1,200 T/R
| modules. It can detect a 5 m2 target at a range of up to 220 km.
| In contrast, the Rafale's RBE2-AA radar uses only 836 gallium
| arsenide (GaAs) modules, with a detection range of about 150 km
| and weaker resistance to jamming. This allows the J-10C to lock
| onto the Rafale first, putting the Indian aircraft at a
| disadvantage.
|
| Missile Range Advantage: The J-10C can carry the PL-15 ultra-
| long-range air-to-air missile, with a range exceeding 200 km,
| enabling it to engage targets from a distance. The Rafale is
| armed with MICA air-to-air missiles, which have a range of less
| than 100 km. Even when fitted with Meteor missiles, the range is
| only about 150 km, clearly inferior in comparison.
|
| Electronic Warfare Capability Gap: The J-10C can carry advanced
| electronic warfare pods such as the RKL-700A, which can disrupt
| the Rafale's radar and communication systems. Moreover, the J-10C
| operates in coordination with the ZDK-03 early warning aircraft,
| which can penetrate cloud cover to locate targets and transmit
| encrypted coordinates to the J-10C via a jam-resistant data link,
| enabling a "silent kill." On the other hand, the Indian Rafale,
| due to its diverse sourcing and poor data link compatibility, is
| at a disadvantage in electronic warfare.
| habinero wrote:
| The US is the world's second biggest manufacturing country,
| almost on par with China. We have lots of manufacturing -- we
| just rely on automation instead of people.
|
| China has something like 20x the number of people working in
| manufacturing. They also have a deep local supply chain.
|
| Putting those things together, they can efficiently handle
| smaller orders or bespoke things.
|
| This whole situation is stupid.
| api wrote:
| It's this simple: in the 1950s and 1960s you could graduate
| high school, get a job, and raise a family, often with home
| ownership as part of the equation. You also had more job
| security, at least for a while.
|
| This past isn't just glorified by MAGA. You also see it
| glorified by the Sanders/AOC wing of the Democrats at times.
|
| Unfortunately neither side's solutions will get us back
| there.
|
| To get back there we'd have to attack the problem from two
| ends.
|
| We would have to raise minimum wage, offer more assistance
| for health care or even full single payer, and to make the
| minimum wage increase work we probably would have to do a
| little of the tariffing and border enforcement MAGA likes...
| but not as much, and with better strategy.
|
| But we would also have to implode the housing market. We'd
| have to MHCA (Make Housing Cheap Again). Real estate cost is
| one of the major reasons you can't live like this anymore.
| Real estate cannot simultaneously be affordable and a good
| investment. We have opted in the past 50 years to protect the
| latter. We would have to switch and go for the former, which
| would destroy home equity.
|
| It would cause problems. See, part of what we have done with
| housing is turn it into a stealth shadow second social
| security system for the middle class and the wealthy. Once
| you get on the housing treadmill your later life and
| retirement is subsidized by real estate appreciation. It's a
| regressive tax, both economically and age wise as it's
| essentially a tax on the young trying to get started.
|
| But killing that system to make housing affordable would
| suddenly leave a ton of elderly people with no savings. The
| government would have to step in here too.
|
| ... which would mean both tax increases and spending cuts,
| and neither is popular.
|
| Simply tariffing like mad and kicking out immigrant
| competition for labor won't work because it won't fix the
| cost disease.
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