people really out here thinking houses maintain themselveshttps://twitter.com/Alysonesque/status/1005989848577073152 …
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Replying to @380kmh
If rent only went toward covering building maintenance and wasn’t a way for landlords to generate profits from their “investment,” we’d all be paying a hell of a lot less (esp in high-demand cities where rents rise w/o corresponding improvements in building quality)
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In a slightly better world, we’d only have to cover the costs of maintenance and utilities, but so long as housing is sold for profit and humans need to live somewhere, landlords have no incentive *not* to suck us dry
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Replying to @drooliet
the costs of maintenance + utilities in their own right, but also the costs of providing for the maintainers + utility workers--what I'm getting at is that no matter how utopian the society, people in it will need to work and pay for their housing
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Replying to @380kmh
firetrucks and streetlamps also cost $ to maintain, but we’ve decided that those are important enough to warrant public funding. Why should housing be any different?
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Replying to @drooliet
A tiny fraction of inhabited streets actually have streetlamps; emergency services are a situation where we rarely actually need them, but need them to be in excellent working order when we DO need them. I argue medical care falls into same category--but not housing or food...
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Replying to @380kmh
In an ideal world, we wouldn’t have to pay for food or shelter, but that would probably involve doing away with capitalism altogether as capitalism functions by exploiting our basic needs...it doesn’t have to be this way........
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Replying to @drooliet
no, food and shelter don't manifest themselves out of thin air--securing them means TIME and effort, which means cost! the costs are much more manageable when every person isn't responsible for building their own house and growing their own food, so we trade, etc etc
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Replying to @380kmh
I’m well aware that these things take time and labor, but the point is that under another economic system we wouldn’t have to exchange *money* for these things to begin with. Nothing about our contemporary capitalist system is natural or inevitable
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not necessarily money, but some kind of voucher which corresponds to time spent, work done, goods provided, etc--but which also accounts for the changing value of work and goods depending on context. So...money.
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