[JackYoustra]

I mean, usually if thing popular, make more of thing until everyone can have it? I guess we could go with your solution of deliberately killing demand with bizarre mechanisms so only a few people can enjoy a holiday instead of pointing the blame where it demands: locals fighting tooth and nail to not build more.

Nimbys are basically hukou advocates in disguise. After all, it's the only solution if you don't primarily place the blame on lack of construction.

[sgdfhijfgsdfgds]

> make more of thing until everyone can have it?

There are literal physical limits on this in many coastal villages and towns -- for example pick almost anywhere on the south west coast of the UK. Not only is the area on which houses can be built restrictive due to geography (and often geology), the transport infrastructure does not scale. New property building both has not caught up with, and probably cannot catch up with, short term demand.

As it happens, a collapse seems likely, because local sentiment is turning against them so fast and because of general economic weakness; the number of "thriving holiday let" properties that are on the market now suggests that Airbnb's own accelerating rental costs problem is going to cause a bit of a bust.

But that bust will not benefit most of the people in the areas affected where the price of a small house is twenty to thirty times the average salary of would-be-first-time-buyers. Those people are leaving, so there will instead be a ghost town. And the sheer number of residents who are temporary has destroyed the potential for long-term stable infrastructure businesses for residents.

> Nimbys are basically hukou advocates in disguise.

It's nothing to do with nimbyism, is it? Nimbys are property owners. The problem only affects people who do not have back yards. They can no longer afford the houses at the prices at which they will be built and the rates at which they can be.

[kelnos]

> It's nothing to do with nimbyism, is it? Nimbys are property owners. The problem only affects people who do not have back yards.

NIMBYs are property owners who vote for restrictive housing development policy in order to prop up their own home values.

Eliminate the NIMBYs and you end up with a lot more people who can have their own backyard.

[bumby]

>Eliminate the NIMBYs

This is said rather matter-of-factly, but how do you propose doing that in a society with democratic values (ie people get a voice in their governance) and also where 70% of most household wealth is in their property?

[JackYoustra]

Japan does this just fine: they have standardized zoning across all municipalities, decided at the national level.

[bumby]

What percent of Japanese household net worth is in their primary residence and how much has this been impacted by their largely stagnant stock market for the last 40 years?

I'm skeptical that national zoning is feasible if for no other reason than the diversity of land and land uses.

[JackYoustra]

Are you arguing for affordability? You can't have both affordability and high price (= huge % of net worth).

It's a very bad thing for people to invest in a fundamentally depreciating asset and expect a return, there's literally no other way to get a return then besides inflation.

And sure, returns have been low, but that's because the real interest rate in Japan for the last 30 years has been negative! You can't get a return if the fundamental balance of loanable funds leads to a negative real interest rate, you need stimulus instead, which they've been trying for over thirty years! And shocker, now that we're seeing Japanese interest rates rise, Japanese stocks are shooting up!

[PaulDavisThe1st]

Don't have to be property owners. Anyone who can show up at a meeting, vote, submit comments ...

[JackYoustra]

Sure, and anyone can make their own crypto implementation that's not based on reference, but what matters isn't the theory but the actual facts: the overwhelming majority of community meeting retirees are retired homeowners.

Look at your local suburban school district's bond: you'll probably see some age-based exemption on paying to get support because old people are by far the most engaged. Is that democratic? In the sense that its based on votes of a voluntary electorate, yes. Is it the representative will? Clearly not! You want to cluster elections around high turnout to maximize representation.

[bluGill]

Anyone can, but existing property owners do.

[rightbyte]

AirBnB did 'eliminate' the NIMBYs by sidestepping local zoning laws.

And the outcome was bad for people living in these targets for mass tourism. Unless they were a YIMBY of course and wanted a hostel in their backyard.

'NIMBY' is like 'Karen' or 'boomer'. Some sort of convenient scapegoat, deserving or not.

[JackYoustra]

I could turn around and say "the outcome was bad for people willing to receive all of the benefits of a free-to-travel society in a bustling town but none of the costs." Of course if you say "mass tourism" it's bad, but idk, do you like to travel? If hundreds of thousands want to visit a beautiful town, should we limit supply in a way that makes it impossible for them to visit? There are millions of alternatives (you could ban lyft or cars for non-natives, you could restrict development to a resort and gated community on one part of town, etc) but the whole reason it's called NIMBY is because the only alternative NIMBYs have is freezing a town in amber while claiming a triple lock raise in pensions.

Zoning laws are, for the most part, a mistake. Any solution to housing prices that isn't a boost in supply either leads to scarcity or hideous Danwei-style planning that reaches into peoples life plans and the ability to afford a future.

[JackYoustra]

Please answer the solution to people not being able to afford back yards. Price is a clearing indicator on supply and demand: you can either crush demand or boost supply. If nimbys block supply increases, you either have to pick people to kick out or forbid other people from moving in.

Where do you think the AirBNBs came from? Some people decided to move out, and the people that moved in decided that others would get better use experiencing the property part-time as reflected in market prices. Would you ban them from making this choice? Would you screen every buyer not based on their own assessed price but on ever so shifting "intent"? Would you make the intent they declare at the start binding?

EDIT: I'll bet you $100 to your charity of choice that physical constraints aren't binding in the case you're thinking of (this could be shown by, despite a lax / encouraging planning environment, no one building anything).