cross-posted from: https://lemmy.crimedad.work/post/12162
Why? Because apparently they need some more incentive to keep units occupied. Also, even though a property might be vacant, there’s still imputed rental income there. Its owner is just receiving it in the form of enjoying the unit for himself instead of receiving an actual rent check from a tenant. That imputed rent ought to be taxed like any other income.
no, because housing is a human right, and the fact that you want to live in a society where someone has commodified your right to survive to this degree, is as pathetic as it is terrifying.
If you don’t think that housing has to be paid for, via any number of reasonable means, then you’re explicitly arguing that you deserve the labor of others. That’s called stealing. And slavery.
If you want to have a reasonable conversation, tell us how you think the workers that produce the materials and build the housing should be paid. The only pathetic thing is when people refuse to answer this question.
Why did you choose to resort to false equivalence? You sounded like you had a point worth discussing until you pulled out this trick.
Regardless of housing being a human right, the space used has to exist, materials have to be used to make or upkeep the structure, and it has to be prevented from decaying to the point it can no longer be habitable.
Building and upkeeping these spaces requires expenditure of resources (building materials, time, work effort). Where is that supposed to come from? Whatever source for these resources exists has to get them from somewhere, and if you don’t expect to have to help upkeep their ability to provide these resources over time, someone else would have to.
There’s no way to magic these resources out of thin air. Even without the grim specter of Capitalism, the wood and nails have to come from somewhere, and someone has to put it together. Someone has to keep it from falling apart.
Any further discussion boils down to: Do you accept the responsibility of contributing your fair share, or do you expect someone else to subsidize your fair share in some way to make up for what you can’t or won’t contribute?
I’m not making any judgement one way or the other, just saying that there is no social/political system in which you can make something out of nothing. Some people are going to over simplify that, but it’s a valid question. Where are these things supposed to come from when someone can’t provide it for themselves? Who should be made responsible?
I don’t have the answers, but calling the expectation that others provide it for you “stealing or slavery” isn’t an absolutely absurd leap.