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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I don't think even that extreme would require doing away with capitalism altogether. Drinking water is effectively free in most of the US and that didn't require doing away with capitalism.
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Actually that’s a good example. My current (government run) water supplier is significantly more expensive than the private water utility I had in a previous house. One extracted profits while the other spent a lot of money on extra water storage of questionable usefulness.
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Word--I'm thinking of how water is a paid utility in Japan, and wondering if that helps avoid Flint MI situations
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Replying to @380kmh @TaupeAvenger and
Presumably Japan has scarcer water than wet low-density places like Canada, Scandinavia, and the Eastern US... (in Israel it's not free.)
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Certainly true for parts of the island, e.g. Hokuriku
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