Member- Apr 28, 2021
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2020 US Presidential Election
- Thread starter Born To Slay
- Start date
- Oct 31, 2020
- 1,254
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- 9-17-2020
- Cause of Tinnitus
- turning everything up to 11
You keep mentioning cheap places, but I'm sure you know why they are cheap - little to no viable employment around those areas. My job requires me to stay around technical areas unless I can finally get to a level of remote work. If that becomes the case then I'd totally get out of the city in a heartbeat.
Guys, I have an incredible idea.
Two birds with one stone kinda thing...
Pool together people who are on the same tinnitus/hypereacusis levels (compatible) and each fronts $500,000 to buy a HUGE mansion.
I'm talking about a 5 million dollar 50 acre Estate with multiple independent sections.
Preferably in somewhere with clean air, ocean/mountain views, etc.
Two birds with one stone kinda thing...
Pool together people who are on the same tinnitus/hypereacusis levels (compatible) and each fronts $500,000 to buy a HUGE mansion.
I'm talking about a 5 million dollar 50 acre Estate with multiple independent sections.
Preferably in somewhere with clean air, ocean/mountain views, etc.
The best jobs are in cities where the high-income people want to live. If you're not able to buy a home in such cities, join the club. But with hard work and sacrifice, perhaps you will be able to. If not, then you'll have to do as I have which is rent an apartment, although I could have purchased a modest home somewhere in NYC, if I had wanted to. I don't know what you expect - as you acknowledged, the cheaper homes are in regions there is less opportunity, this is just a fact that has always been the case.
- Oct 31, 2020
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- 9-17-2020
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- turning everything up to 11
What I expect is a stop put to private equity firms buying up massive amounts of homes and driving the prices to insane levels.
I would expect central bankers to come back to sanity too, and raise interest rates.
But we know how this is going to end. Central banks will keep denying inflation, and manipulating inflation records, because they are now in a corner. They do not want to raise interest rates, even if that's what central banks should have done already, a few years ago.
The initial plan of Mario Draghi was to raise interest rates in 2018. The economy was doing well then, but governments are just addicted to issuing more and more public debt. This game is ruining the average guy.
Cheap money has just put the tech firms, the FAANG on their feet. No company can afford to lose thousands of millions before it comes profitable. It only happens if someone is giving them the money away, if there is an unlimited supply of money.
So the FAANG profited and the average guy lost due to inflation. This spiral cannot go on forever. It has to stop.
If they are at "insane" levels, then only the insane will buy them, and I don't think that this will happen. It's not the government's place to say who can buy and sell property. If you ask homeowners, most are in favor of the market being high.
It's your government who is letting the FED drive real estate prices to insane levels. Don't you remember Trump telling the FED to print more and more money and to lower interest rates?
Here in Europe is the ECB who is also making real estate prices break record highs.
They will provoke another economic crisis.
What do you think of this? Is there a public debate in the Netherlands about inflation and the price of houses?Ahww... who doesn't feel sad for little George P. Bush right know? But his dad, Jeb, probably doesn't feel too unhappy about it
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Netherlands grapples with social consequences of soaring house prices | Financial Times (ft.com)
FT Series: Prices have risen almost 15% over past year as Dutch face shortage of 330,000 homes
The Dutch property market has become a burning political issue. Prices of existing homes in the Netherlands rose 14.6 per cent in the year to June, the highest rate for two decades — and one of the highest in the EU.
Summary:
These are the guys responsible for it: "Like the rest of Europe, the Dutch housing market fell sharply after both the 2008 global banking crisis and the 2012 eurozone debt crisis. But residential property prices have been rebounding strongly since the European Central Bank cut interest rates into negative territory seven years ago, pushing down mortgage costs. Further stimulus measures since the start of the coronavirus pandemic have stoked the boom."
Oxford Economics last month ranked the Netherlands as the riskiest housing market of any developed economy as house prices were 14.3 per cent above their long-term trend, while the price-to-rent ratio was 15.3 per cent above its long-term trend.
Bakker said the government should stop allowing homeowners to deduct the cost of mortgage interest payments from their tax liabilities — even though he benefits from this policy himself and he acknowledged it was "difficult politically".
Removing the tax break is one of the conditions Brussels has sought from the Netherlands in return for its share of the €800bn EU recovery fund.
Soaring house prices are "not good for social cohesion", Marjon said. "Teachers in our kids' school can't afford somewhere to live... It is not good for the atmosphere of the city. Pretty soon, nobody will be living in the city any more apart from very rich people and foreigners."
History repeats itself:
Bernanke said in 2005 there's no housing bubble...
Bernanke: There's No Housing Bubble to Go Bust
Bernanke said in 2005 there's no housing bubble...
Bernanke: There's No Housing Bubble to Go Bust
- Apr 6, 2020
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- 2016
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- 2016: headphones, 2020: worsened thanks to Rammstein
Yeah, the situation here is absolutely nuts. I don't know much about real estate economics, but what I can say is that real estate investors really screw up the local housing market. Blackstone is one of those major investment companies that buys houses and consequently rent them for more money (sometimes 3x as much) than previous rent level. If I'm not mistaken, Blackstone is also very active in the Spanish housing market. Ooph, good luck with that
Another reason is the failure of our housing cooperatives that rent social housing to people with low income. But it's not entirely their fault, I have to add. These cooperatives pay a considerable amount of taxes by the government for their housing property. This doesn't give them the necessary budget to build new houses & maintain their current house stock. However, talks are underway in the current coalition negotiation to abolish this ''property tax'', so that cooperatives can give a new impulse in the housing market.
So basically, starters and low income households are royally screwed by both private investor groups and the government.
How's the situation in your country, Juan? Are there also major differences between coastal cities and places in the ''heartland'' of Spain?
Yes, Blackstone and other funds like Cerberus, Lone Star etc are quite active in Spain. This seems a global trend. Funds are parking their "excess liquidity" in real estate, which raises the following question: if there is excess liquidity to be parked, why are central banks increasing the monetary supply via QE?
Here there is a real estate bubble as well, in major cities like Madrid, Barcelona, Málaga, Palma, San Sebastián. In the rest of the country prices went up a lot too, but did not reach the crazy levels one can find in Málaga, for instance.
Basically people who do not have previous assets to trade cannot get into this "game" and buy a home to live in. This is another facet of the gamification of economy, the new casino economy fuelled by central banks and artificially low interest rates.
Young people and those who earn low incomes are priced out of the market, not only in the hot spots like Madrid or Málaga but also in secondary cities, suburban areas surrounding the main cities.
Here "young" people (nowadays young in Spain means 40 or below) are sharing or have to face long commutes.
How can people afford living in Amsterdam or The Hague nowadays? Is Rotterdam as expensive?
We would be better off to discuss the imbeciles that are in the White House, right now, rather than Housing and Real Estate for Dummies.
We now have the vaccines, yet the death rates from COVID-19 are the same as before. Biden and his stooge Harris have failed to do their job, and have blood on their hands.
They spread lies about the vaccine, before the election, and now we are paying the price - with over 215,000 new deaths since these people have been sworn in.
400,000 deaths over the course of one year, without a vaccine. Trump was blamed.
By next January, at the rate we are going, there will be 400,000 deaths, possibly more, despite the availability of vaccines. Are we going to ignore this fact, and say that Biden and that woman have done a good job? They should be kicked out.
From today's NY Times:
1. For the first time since February, the U.S. is averaging more than 100,000 new cases a day.
We now have the vaccines, yet the death rates from COVID-19 are the same as before. Biden and his stooge Harris have failed to do their job, and have blood on their hands.
They spread lies about the vaccine, before the election, and now we are paying the price - with over 215,000 new deaths since these people have been sworn in.
400,000 deaths over the course of one year, without a vaccine. Trump was blamed.
By next January, at the rate we are going, there will be 400,000 deaths, possibly more, despite the availability of vaccines. Are we going to ignore this fact, and say that Biden and that woman have done a good job? They should be kicked out.
From today's NY Times:
1. For the first time since February, the U.S. is averaging more than 100,000 new cases a day.
- May 16, 2017
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Like your comment. Many politicians in the US have a position in Blackstone Real Estate Trust (BREIT).
Increasing population makes for a real estate or renting money making machine and investment in lots of real estate takes wealth.
In the US, a high gross national product (GNP) is from increased population. The US dollar is still strong with increased debt. Much of this debt accumulation is to pay for life accessories or wants of the poor, that includes free rent.
The poor is given monies and that helps the GNP and the rich become richer. The poor are rewarded to have more children. Good for the poor, but no one cares about the middle class on a fixed budget that will see more financial struggle. Middle class retired that live on a fixed income and pay taxes, financial assistance isn't available to them if they presently have 26,000 banked dollars and/or own a home. Because of this, they often won't spend for better life needs as they need to have budget concerns.
Another group that is being left out is those with disability. Many can't get disability even when they have no money. The disabled need money for necessary life needs, but are being denied disability funds because those funds are not spent within the greater economy. I know of many that worked for many years and paid taxes that are denied disability for serious illness or injury.
One major symptom of TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome), which is now evident all over the nation and world, is a quasi-religious belief that Biden and Harris can do no wrong, even as COVID-19 victims are dropping like flies while she cackles, and he says, "Hey, man!". If you say anything critical about the way they are handling their jobs, you are instantly shamed as being a Trump supporter.
Young people, who should be outraged, sit around like little old ladies, saying what a nice man he is, and how wonderful she is. It's beyond disgusting, it's mental illness.
Young people, who should be outraged, sit around like little old ladies, saying what a nice man he is, and how wonderful she is. It's beyond disgusting, it's mental illness.
The aim of the global real estate bubble is squeezing the middle class, which will progressively disappear.
We will be paying the taxes that Jeff Bezos and Peter Thiel do not pay, and we will all be paying rent to Blackrock and Warren Buffett.
Buffett has several times said he would be happy to be taxed more. That's easier done than said: he just has to give away some of his money to the government, not to his fake philantropies.
It is also shocking how, during their accelerated divorce, Bill and Melinda Gates split the money held by their foundation. If this is philantropy, is there any need to split that?
- Apr 28, 2021
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- Apr 6, 2020
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- 2016: headphones, 2020: worsened thanks to Rammstein
Nicely put, and I actually am wondering the same thing. It's like these major investment groups and conglomerates have successfully lobbied to be excluded in internal market corrections by the (European) Central Bank. They already did that successfully on local scale, when they convinced my government that a market driven housing market would work more efficiently and more adaptive to the needs of people, and now we're not really seeing the benefits of this free-for-all system.
That's a good observation and I think this is also applicable on a more global scale. It's basically a system that already helps the haves but the not-haves will be kept away from moving up the social and economic ladder.
If you look at the outcomes of economic policy in Europe on local and global scale, so called ''technocratic'' institutes are in fact political institutions that are stuck in the economic orthodoxy that free enterprise would work more efficiently and more receptive to what the consumers want (AKA Adam's Smith's invisible hand theory that the conflict of self interest between producers and consumers would eventually end up serving the greater good).
I belief I've read a story (from many years ago) that business schools don't take political economy seriously as a subject. This might be an important thing, since future economists are often not aware that policy is ideology driven, whether it's a conscious process or not. And since we live in an era in which liberal democracy has practically won the ideological battle (according to Francis Fukuyama), it's still important how we can learn from different theories (e.g., Marxism, cooperatism), and thus from different perspectives, how best to manage the economy.
It's insanely expensive. The problem is two fold: brain drain from the economically less developed regions & the immigration of expats. The Hague, Rotterdam and Amsterdam are located in an agglomeration called Randstad. It's a bit similar to the more renowned Ruhr area of Dortmund-Essen-Duisburg-Bochum. So, we're basically tied to each other economically and logistically. For example, people who live in Amsterdam often go to The Hague/Rotterdam/Utrecht for work & vice versa.
There are a lot of good universities in this area, so a lot of people from peripheral areas (like Limburg, Friesland) go to the Randstad to study and eventually settle there as young urban professionals. Of course, this would create new opportunities for neighbourhoods to redevelop, but also pose problems for people who are already living there for years and years (rise on rent, more expensive stores, etc.).
The Randstad is also attractive for expats. Major and renowned institutes are situated in this place, like the UN and Shell. They pay well and expats are, of course, more than willing to make the jump for an opportunity at one of those big concerns & earn a generous salary as a nice bonus. Suffice to say, they can easily outbuy people who already live here for some of those available houses . And that's what we're currently seeing in the four major cities.
Maybe a market driven housing market would work efficiently if the market had not been previously intervened by central banks and governments.
To me, selling thousands of previously publicly owned houses to funds like Blackstone sounds like govenment intervention, and this did happen in Spain, thousands of social houses were sold to those funds.
Keeping interest rates insanely low is also market intervention. Central banks are actually making up inflation, they are cooking the data, and that's really serious. They are constantly and consistently underestimating inflation to try to justify their absurd politics.
That could be a contributing factor but not the only one. There has to be something more, related to politics and regulation.
Think of Vienna, for instance, the UN is there, the OPEC is there, and Austrians in general earn nice salaries. Real estate is pricey, but prices does not reach crazy levels, relative to salaries.
In Germany there are also talks about merging Vonovia and Deutsche Wohnen, which would not help real estate prices to go down, due to increased concentration.
At least Germany has renters unions in some cities like Berlin, to try to fight abuses by huge corporations.
At least Germany has renters unions in some cities like Berlin, to try to fight abuses by huge corporations.
The Financial Times is running a series on the global real estate bubble. It was about time.
This is today's article:
'My flat is now a commodity': Berlin to vote on seizing rental properties
This is today's article:
'My flat is now a commodity': Berlin to vote on seizing rental properties
There will be a referendum in Berlin next month on expropiating (or better said "buying back") property from corporations that act as landlords of thousands of apartments:
"After collecting more than 350,000 petition signatures, their proposal — which targets corporate landlords with more than 3,000 apartments each — will be voted on in a local referendum in September. Polling suggests nearly half of Berliners support expropriation, which would force the companies to sell their properties to the city government at a "fair" price."
And this is the real estate bubble that the ECB has been ignoring for a few years already:
"The market capitalisation of Europe's publicly listed residential property sector has grown from €3.5bn in 2006 to nearly €85bn at the end of July this year, according to the European Public Real Estate Association."
"After collecting more than 350,000 petition signatures, their proposal — which targets corporate landlords with more than 3,000 apartments each — will be voted on in a local referendum in September. Polling suggests nearly half of Berliners support expropriation, which would force the companies to sell their properties to the city government at a "fair" price."
And this is the real estate bubble that the ECB has been ignoring for a few years already:
"The market capitalisation of Europe's publicly listed residential property sector has grown from €3.5bn in 2006 to nearly €85bn at the end of July this year, according to the European Public Real Estate Association."
- Apr 6, 2020
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- 2016: headphones, 2020: worsened thanks to Rammstein
Hi Greg, thanks for all this information about the current state of the middle class (& people with disability) in the US.
So, the main gist is that the middle class is actually squeezed by both lower class and the rich? I thought that the poor in the US are actually in a very bad position. The relatively low minimum wage, the food stamps, long lines in front of food banks & no health coverage are giving me the impression that Joe/Jane average is having a hard time.
Don't you think that Joe Biden is actively working to create policies that work for the middle class? I've seen many speeches of your president, during which he often mentions that the middle class needs to be rebuild as the main engine of America's economy. So it seems to me that he is really taking this issue seriously.
