Gentrification

[Esper]

For a brief explanation, gentrification is when people with money buy property in poor areas. This makes the property values better and can bring in new jobs, stores, etc., but it can push out people who can't then afford to live in the area anymore because of higher rents, etc. It's a popular topic for discussion so let's discuss.

I'll keep my personal comments brief for the moment. Gentrification is something I'm seeing where I live (the greater San Francisco area) and people I know keep having to move further away from SF (where the jobs are) to areas where the rents are affordable but the jobs aren't plentiful. That makes for some hard times.

 

[Hiidoran]

Gentrification seems to be that issue people don't really want to talk about in most cities... but it's a sticky problem, huh? On one hand, you're technically improving the often blighted areas of a city; making them safer, more economically sound. However, there's the small issue of the people who once called that place home and now can no longer afford the increased rent or taxes... what to do about them?

I've seen this happening in quite a few historic neighborhoods in my home city of Indianapolis, and while I personally love how Massachusetts Ave. (Mass Ave as it's so cutely referred) is now a happening gay culture scene in an otherwise fairly conservative area, making it "safe," for the people who have the extra income to buy fancy drinks and eat at waaaaay overpriced restaurants came at the cost of throwing quite a few people out of their homes due to increased property tax.

Personally, I feel displacement is an unfair method to "revitalize" parts of the city. It goes into the whole, "you're unsightly and unsafe because you're poor," problem. I've heard of some areas giving landlords incentives for maintaining current tenants or cities creating "displacement-free" blocks, though I almost fail to see how that's even possible. Either way, any effort to combat population polarization gets my vote, as vague as that may sound.

 

[Lotus the Cat]

I don't personally have an issue with gentrification. My perception of it, as far as it has occurred in my city, is that it is an inevitable process. Back in the 70s the inner city areas were quite industrial and were inhabited by blue collar workers. Manufacturing then moved out to the suburbs and the labour workforce followed. At the same time, Australia has undergone a shift in our economy and at the moment we are mostly a services and knowledge based economy. As a result, the city centres are dominated by white collar professionals. This has resulted in the gentrification of inner city areas, as these professionals do not wish to commute as long to the CBD for work, increasing prices of housing stock and pushing out lower earners to the further suburbs. At the moment this is a creeping trend and the fringe of "affordability" is creeping ever outwards.

I haven't been really aware of the larger displacement issue, at the moment the focus on housing in our country is mostly on the younger generation in general not being able to afford housing (regardless of career). Living in the inner city suburbs comes with a price tag well over $1 million (unless you buy a tiny apartment). There are still many public housing buildings within high-end inner city areas, which may be some way of minimising displacement, although I have to admit I find it odd to be walking down the street in some high-end parts of the city, passing by rich people and then shortly after passing by people from public housing.

There has also been other causes for gentrification in my city, including access to high ranking public schools that have zoning restrictions. As people want their children to be able to attend said public school, they will pay a premium on houses within its zone. Real estate agents will list one of the features of these houses as being in the school zone, and they can even sell for $100,000s more than nearby houses not within the school zone.

 

[Her]

Gentrification becomes more inevitable the larger the city/area is, but I think more attention in this topic should be placed on the undeniable racial aspect of many gentrification scenarios. It's a pretty obvious point, but nonetheless. Higher class, more 'livable' areas are more often than not whiter in residential complexion, in contrast to poorer areas often being populated by racial minorities. Gentrification is a cruel process that often serves to further geographical boundaries between white communities and other communities, either through indifference of those taking part or realising that driving out the poor black people is a surefire way to cash in on white money. Again, I think this point is pretty obvious for anyone who is aware of gentrification, but I thought it should be elaborated on for the sake of the topic.

 

[Lotus the Cat]

Gentrification becomes more inevitable the larger the city/area is, but I think more attention in this topic should be placed on the undeniable racial aspect of many gentrification scenarios. It's a pretty obvious point, but nonetheless. Higher class, more 'livable' areas are more often than not whiter in residential complexion, in contrast to poorer areas often being populated by racial minorities. Gentrification is a cruel process that often serves to further geographical boundaries between white communities and other communities, either through indifference of those taking part or realising that driving out the poor black people is a surefire way to cash in on white money. Again, I think this point is pretty obvious for anyone who is aware of gentrification, but I thought it should be elaborated on for the sake of the topic.

That's a big assumption that is not always true. For example, some gentrification in Australia is driven by Chinese migrants.

 

[Nihilego]

Let's not superimpose a race issue onto what is very clearly, consistently and bluntly obviously a class issue. There are many examples of where white people are getting pushed out of their homes by gentrification, or where the people pushing them out are not white. There is a good example above, and another major one I can think of is London - where both white and black (and everybody in-between (it's also worth considering that there are many races and cultures inside "white" and "black" - see, for example, Polish families in England)) families who have been living in the city's outer areas for generations are being pushed out, particularly by extremely rich Chinese and other Asian investors who see impoverished areas as business opportunities or, worse, "edgy" and "atmospheric". Just because it's rich vs poor doesn't automatically make it a racist issue and the idea that white people are trying to further the geographical boundaries between themselves and black people through this process is honestly very farfetched. It's money and greed, not race, that drives gentrification.

 

[Her]

Oh yeah I'm not disagreeing with either of you, I'm just pointing out how there is a racial element.

 

[Keiran]

Let's not superimpose a race issue onto what is very clearly, consistently and bluntly obviously a class issue. There are many examples of where white people are getting pushed out of their homes by gentrification, or where the people pushing them out are not white. There is a good example above, and another major one I can think of is London - where both white and black (and everybody in-between (it's also worth considering that there are many races and cultures inside "white" and "black" - see, for example, Polish families in England)) families who have been living in the city's outer areas for generations are being pushed out, particularly by extremely rich Chinese and other Asian investors who see impoverished areas as business opportunities or, worse, "edgy" and "atmospheric". Just because it's rich vs poor doesn't automatically make it a racist issue and the idea that white people are trying to further the geographical boundaries between themselves and black people through this process is honestly very farfetched. It's money and greed, not race, that drives gentrification.

That may be true for Europe. It's primarily a race issue in the US because gentrification was superimposed with redlining created and executed by the FHA in the 20th century. These processes have developed notorious areas, like Camden and Detroit, into what they are today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_segregation_in_the_United_States#Neighborhood_disinvestment

 

[gimmepie]

I won't speak as though I know much about this outside of my own country, so I'll just talk about how it is here.

Lotus pretty much summed up what happens so I won't go into that again either, but I feel saying "we're on the fringe of affordability" doesn't quite sum up exactly how problematic things are getting. Especially when you consider that Australian city's have some of highest property rates - for rent or sale - in the world. For a lot of us in the lower socio-economic classes, say mid-lower middle class or less, it is getting to the point where we can't afford to live scarily quickly.

The cost of living, in particularly in regards to the prices of housing, in suburban or city areas is extremely high and is steadily increasing whilst wages aren't. This pushes people further out of the areas they want/need to live in and on some occasions even forces people to move to rural areas where they lose a lot of opportunities they would have had in the suburbs.

I'm coming to a point where I'm going to be looking to move out and find my own place in the next few years but that's a terrifying prospect the way things are going here. Unless something is done in the near future things are going to become very dicey.

 

[Castaigne]

Complaining about gentrification is really a waste of time as long as you're talking about a free market. Gentrification is not a new thing, and while it's a race issue in the United States, it's really only recently become a race issue. Once the switch from projects to vouchers started it was pretty much inevitable that gentrification was going to become a race issue despite the fact that at it's core it's economic. Gentrification is just a nasty name for development and avoiding that connection isn't going to make it go away. Where I'm from, gentrification actually happened at such a high rate that businesses can't keep up with it. The "in" part of the city simply rotates along the outskirts and development follows a couple years too late. The end result is that we have a lot of businesses have a couple good years and then a decade of pain. Ironically it doesn't affect the people of the city because they can just squat their house for an extra couple years before they can sell for a decent price again.

 

[Esper]

Complaining about gentrification is really a waste of time as long as you're talking about a free market. Gentrification is not a new thing, and while it's a race issue in the United States, it's really only recently become a race issue. Once the switch from projects to vouchers started it was pretty much inevitable that gentrification was going to become a race issue despite the fact that at it's core it's economic. Gentrification is just a nasty name for development and avoiding that connection isn't going to make it go away. Where I'm from, gentrification actually happened at such a high rate that businesses can't keep up with it. The "in" part of the city simply rotates along the outskirts and development follows a couple years too late. The end result is that we have a lot of businesses have a couple good years and then a decade of pain. Ironically it doesn't affect the people of the city because they can just squat their house for an extra couple years before they can sell for a decent price again.

One could argue that in the United States race and economics are intrinsically tied together, and that development is just a sanitized word for something we call gentrification. But that aside, yeah, it's a free market, economic issue. But since the market is something we could control more if we wanted it seems like we could do something to make it easier for people to continue to live where they already do. You know, like put limits on what can be charged for rent, or if not something like that then at least put in more infrastructure to make it easier for people to get to and from where they used to live where their work might be and where they had to move to.

 

[Castaigne]

One could argue that in the United States race and economics are intrinsically tied together, and that development is just a sanitized word for something we call gentrification. But that aside, yeah, it's a free market, economic issue. But since the market is something we could control more if we wanted it seems like we could do something to make it easier for people to continue to live where they already do. You know, like put limits on what can be charged for rent, or if not something like that then at least put in more infrastructure to make it easier for people to get to and from where they used to live where their work might be and where they had to move to.

If you want to look at what has empirically been the most effective, project housing actually beats vouchers with ease. We've proven pretty conclusively that section 8 is a failure for all involved except landlords. It basically took a problem we could solve (concentrated crime and poverty) and traded it for one we can't (diffuse crime and lower quality of life across the country with the destruction of established communities). The Atlantic has several great pieces on the topic, although I don't agree with their conclusions.
General knowledge
Failure of Section 8
Landlords and Section 8

And to address your point on infrastructure, I'll just give you this link to Vox.

 

[Esper]

If you want to look at what has empirically been the most effective, project housing actually beats vouchers with ease. We've proven pretty conclusively that section 8 is a failure for all involved except landlords. It basically took a problem we could solve (concentrated crime and poverty) and traded it for one we can't (diffuse crime and lower quality of life across the country with the destruction of established communities). The Atlantic has several great pieces on the topic, although I don't agree with their conclusions.
General knowledge
Failure of Section 8
Landlords and Section 8

And to address your point on infrastructure, I'll just give you this link to Vox.

I've only had time to skim through these links, but on the whole I don't disagree with the portrayal of landlords and the state of public transportation in America. I know that these are high mountains to climb, but my previous comment was more about how it's not physically impossible so it should be possible (in a better world) to implement things to make life easier for people feeling the push of gentrification.

 

[Sir Codin]

> America
> "Free-market"

 

[gimmepie]

> America
> "Free-market"

It might help if you actually expand on your points instead of making snide comments. Especially for those of us who aren't American and know very little about the American market.

 

[Esper]

It might help if you actually expand on your points instead of making snide comments. Especially for those of us who aren't American and know very little about the American market.

I'm guessing that he's laughing at American being called "free-market" because a "true" free market would have no regulations or restrictions or protections on anything. So, like, if a "real" free market you could trade child porn for heroin or you could buy up all the grocery stores in an area and charge 10 times the normal price for things. Of course these are extreme examples, but you get the idea.

I don't know where the joke is exactly because America is quite a bit more "market friendly" than most industrial countries.

 

[Sir Codin]

https://www.heritage.org/index/

Canada, Singapore, hell even Hong Kong have higher economic freedom than the United States does.

Also: "free-market" = "child porn legal" Nice strawman there, Esper.

 

[Esper]

https://www.heritage.org/index/

Canada, Singapore, hell even Hong Kong have higher economic freedom than the United States does.

Also: "free-market" = "child porn legal" Nice strawman there, Esper.

As I said, an extreme example, to illustrate that "free market" = " fewer restrictions on economic activities".

And I wouldn't personally trust that website's analysis since it considers government spending as a bad thing, giving countries like Sudan high marks for spending very little and countries like Denmark very low marks for, apparently, spending money on things, presumably services. Assistance from the government could be something to help offset the negative effects of gentrification.

 

[Sir Codin]

As I said, an extreme example, to illustrate that "free market" = " fewer restrictions on economic activities".

And I wouldn't personally trust that website's analysis since it considers government spending as a bad thing, giving countries like Sudan high marks for spending very little and countries like Denmark very low marks for, apparently, spending money on things, presumably services. Assistance from the government could be something to help offset the negative effects of gentrification.

This is where you, me, and most of this forum are going to disagree no matter what, which is why I don't waste my time articulating my points anymore, instead going for what I went with in my first post here. Essentially a "here's what I think you" kind of vibe.

I don't think highly of you or God, or most anyone on this part of the forum in particular who shares your views and I doubt that is going to change.

 

[Castaigne]

https://www.heritage.org/index/

Canada, Singapore, hell even Hong Kong have higher economic freedom than the United States does.

Also: "free-market" = "child porn legal" Nice strawman there, Esper.

Yet if you look at property rights, the US is pretty up there. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying we're the last bastion of the free market, but our housing market is very open compared to the Eurozone or Asia.