it's not a lottery. it's based on need. if your income is high enough that you don't qualify then most likely you can afford regular housing. sure here are always edge cases, and some people slip through the gaps, and you also already have to be living in the city for a few years (the rule is now two years, it used to be longer), so it's not available to everyone, but if you are already a resident then it's unlikely that you'll have to leave.
i might understand that if you showed me the actual criticism and evidence that substantiated it.
the system in vienna may not be perfect, but it does better than any other large city in austria and germany and maybe even in europe. criticizing is easy, but i don't think it's fair when the situation everywhere else is worse.
You haven't asked a single question. It's always a waste to engage when people start with "you're wrong". If you engage differently next time I would try!
i am sorry it comes across that way. it's kind of difficult to use a different approach when you make claims that i believe to be without any basis. my believe could be wrong of course, but as i am from vienna i do pay attention to what happens there to an extent, and in particular i compare it to other german cities, so i believe myself to be informed about this matter.
your first claim: vienna has become unaffordable because of its subsidized housing.
that claim in itself makes no sense because subsidies are what makes housing affordable. if your argument is that it caused the prices of the private market to go up, then that is false too because munich and berlin have average rents that are even higher, and other german cities are on par. vienna private rent prices are not out of the ordinary for a city that size. in other words subsidizing housing can't have had any worse effect on the private rental market than whatever those cities in germany do.
your second claim: Vienna can't grow anymore as a result.
vienna is building almost 10k homes every year and has been doing so for the last decade or more. that may not be enough, but that's certainly not for lack of space. there is still plenty of space for the city to grow, especially in the east part of the city where farmland is within the city borders.
i am countering your claims. what do you expect me to ask here? do you have any evidence for your claims?
you say you wished that i understood that there were real criticisms.
well, what are these criticisms? again, compared to other large german cities which are mostly worse i find it hard to believe that there is any valid criticism against vienna's approach. but let's hear it, i am willing to accept that i am wrong because i may have missed something. so what am i missing?