[nomilk]

Australia is currently a case of too much money chasing too few goods [1], especially in its rental market. Huge net migrations into Australia without commensurate increases in housing stock have caused rent increases but also left some without a place to live and caused some long-term tenants to be unable to continue to afford their place [2].

Most Australians just see their salaries go a little less far (due to inflation), but on the extreme end it means homelessness, at least in the short term, and all the associated stress.

Media has a tendency to piggyback off the hype around this legitimate problem to peddle all sorts of weird and wonderful ideas, sometimes over simplifying the narrative to (wealthy|employer|landlord) == bad, and (poor|employee|renter) == good.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demand-pull_inflation#:~:text=....

[2] https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-12-12/immigration-house-pri...

[crooked-v]

It's astounding sometimes to see the sheer scope of conspiracy theories people will invent just to avoid even considering building more housing.

[edward28]

The problem is housing in Australia has been turned into an investment. The Howard government in the 90's gave houses only 50% capital gains tax, which puts it inline with stocks. This has led to rampant speculation in the property market and the idea the price can only ever go up.

[pan69]

I wonder if there are numbers available on this. E.g, oversimplification, if 50% of the population owns 100% of the real estate would mean that the other 50% can't buy.

[lmpdev]

Legal reform is still needed though

Negative gearing must be scrapped and the capital gains tax wound back to pre-Howard levels

The speculation on people’s shelter needs to end

————————

Reforms aside, I agree housing stock must lift. How we can achieve that with such pervasive red tape at the local government level is beyond me

One fairly extreme capitalist approach (Japan’s) was covered in this great summary by ABC Australia (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5pPcV54kiQ)

I don’t think it’s a conspiracy theory to say that Japanification of the west’s economies is here to stay, and we need legal, economic and cultural reform to adapt to the changing needs of our housing

The status quo cannot persist without great pain