When it comes to different eras, prices aren't always the important variable. Many things were relatively expensive in the 50s. Travel and restaurants have always been fairly expensive. The important variable is income. Before 1980 ordinary jobs paid a lot better than they do now, so ordinary workers could afford more of the relatively expensive things.
Two big exceptions: housing and medical care are WILDLY expensive now by every possible comparison. For those two necessities, price IS the variable.
I feel like this also ties into the previous things you've written about the low end of the market disappearing. There used to be local amusement parks that were mostly patronized be people who lived nearby or who happened to be passing through. These places are mostly gone now.
I think a part of what caused their demise is that, in an era when everyone has a internet-connected smart phone, we demand a higher level of entertainment than we used to. The kind of amusement park that consists of a couple of wacky rides and a petting zoo may just not be enticing enough to convince people to leave the house these days.
So, we end up with high-end theme parks like Disney World, some more mid-tier places like Six Flags, but nothing on the low end.
I had not thought of that connection but yes, this is a really smart comment. The housing analogy is closer there with the disappearance of starter homes, too, although the reasons/economics at play are probably different
Yeah, there may be a tenuous economic connection relating to for-profit companies chasing the higher end of the market where there are greater profit margins. The difference is that there are plenty of people who would buy a small starter home if such a thing was available for a price they could afford, while I'm not sure that there's still a viable business model for "small local amusement park".
An online gaming company could solve this by having tiered competition. You compete in the C League until you have accumulated enough points by high finishes to be promoted to the B League and then compete on that level until you earn promotion to the open A league. Of course, C league players could play on the B or a league level if they wanted to get their butts whipped.
I used to participate in an amateur sport that had this kind of tiered competition. They only had A and B levels, but if someone won on the B level all of his competitors would chant “Move up! Move up!" when he collected his award for that day's win.
I haven't thought this out yet, but I sense a tension between "People should be forced to move away from their homes and communities" and "People should be able to move where they please without prohibitive cost or accusations of entitlement." It may be that we have to choose one or the other. At the moment we're trying to pick both and thereby getting neither.
> In other words, we think of homes, neighborhoods, towns, and cities as consumer goods at all different market segments, rather than as shared, civic places that nobody owns and that should almost by definition be open to a big cross-section of society.
I think this is right. But two things really do complicate it:
- Shelter isn’t optional, so if we think of housing as a prize to be won, we’re consigning people to misery or death. (This is the housing trap of encouraging housing to be an investment.)
- Land actually is zero sum. So, if I just absolutely love my little village exactly the way it is, and then thousands of new people move in and build homes etc., then the village I loved doesn’t exist anymore.
I think the problem is less that we’ve *lost* the idea that nobody owns the city as much as that we’ve *created* the idea that actually people living in the village do own it and have a right to freeze it as it is and not see any change. (Although those are two sides of the same coin)
But one of the reasons this happened is that post-war development has been really shitty. More people mostly means less nature, more tacky buildings “on trend”, and most of all so much more traffic congestion. Whereas in the historic city, architecture was better and more consistent, and more foot traffic mostly meant more and more businesses, and more variety of things to do. We really changed the world in such a way that growth became much worse for existing residents, so we shouldn’t be too shocked that people mobilized against it.
When it comes to different eras, prices aren't always the important variable. Many things were relatively expensive in the 50s. Travel and restaurants have always been fairly expensive. The important variable is income. Before 1980 ordinary jobs paid a lot better than they do now, so ordinary workers could afford more of the relatively expensive things.
Two big exceptions: housing and medical care are WILDLY expensive now by every possible comparison. For those two necessities, price IS the variable.
The analogy of gaming going from local and social to online and hypercompetitive describes job searching better than homebuying.
In Northern Virginia, homebuying is sure like that too, but yeah, the job market and application system is nuts all around
I feel like this also ties into the previous things you've written about the low end of the market disappearing. There used to be local amusement parks that were mostly patronized be people who lived nearby or who happened to be passing through. These places are mostly gone now.
I think a part of what caused their demise is that, in an era when everyone has a internet-connected smart phone, we demand a higher level of entertainment than we used to. The kind of amusement park that consists of a couple of wacky rides and a petting zoo may just not be enticing enough to convince people to leave the house these days.
So, we end up with high-end theme parks like Disney World, some more mid-tier places like Six Flags, but nothing on the low end.
I had not thought of that connection but yes, this is a really smart comment. The housing analogy is closer there with the disappearance of starter homes, too, although the reasons/economics at play are probably different
Yeah, there may be a tenuous economic connection relating to for-profit companies chasing the higher end of the market where there are greater profit margins. The difference is that there are plenty of people who would buy a small starter home if such a thing was available for a price they could afford, while I'm not sure that there's still a viable business model for "small local amusement park".
An online gaming company could solve this by having tiered competition. You compete in the C League until you have accumulated enough points by high finishes to be promoted to the B League and then compete on that level until you earn promotion to the open A league. Of course, C league players could play on the B or a league level if they wanted to get their butts whipped.
I used to participate in an amateur sport that had this kind of tiered competition. They only had A and B levels, but if someone won on the B level all of his competitors would chant “Move up! Move up!" when he collected his award for that day's win.
I haven't thought this out yet, but I sense a tension between "People should be forced to move away from their homes and communities" and "People should be able to move where they please without prohibitive cost or accusations of entitlement." It may be that we have to choose one or the other. At the moment we're trying to pick both and thereby getting neither.
*shouldn't be forced
> In other words, we think of homes, neighborhoods, towns, and cities as consumer goods at all different market segments, rather than as shared, civic places that nobody owns and that should almost by definition be open to a big cross-section of society.
I think this is right. But two things really do complicate it:
- Shelter isn’t optional, so if we think of housing as a prize to be won, we’re consigning people to misery or death. (This is the housing trap of encouraging housing to be an investment.)
- Land actually is zero sum. So, if I just absolutely love my little village exactly the way it is, and then thousands of new people move in and build homes etc., then the village I loved doesn’t exist anymore.
I think the problem is less that we’ve *lost* the idea that nobody owns the city as much as that we’ve *created* the idea that actually people living in the village do own it and have a right to freeze it as it is and not see any change. (Although those are two sides of the same coin)
But one of the reasons this happened is that post-war development has been really shitty. More people mostly means less nature, more tacky buildings “on trend”, and most of all so much more traffic congestion. Whereas in the historic city, architecture was better and more consistent, and more foot traffic mostly meant more and more businesses, and more variety of things to do. We really changed the world in such a way that growth became much worse for existing residents, so we shouldn’t be too shocked that people mobilized against it.