zlacker

Yup.

The Power of Pricing is a thing that exists whether you want it to or not. Smart policy uses it to great advantage. Dumb policy redirects this to hurt those it intends to help. Rent control, restrictions on production, byzantine zoning and construction rules... all contribute to distorting the market in ways that push back on the original (or at least, stated) intentions.

You want housing to be cheaper? Increase supply. That's it. You don't want foreign investment in your properties? Don't make them so damn attractive as pure investment vehicles. How? Increase supply.

There's always a boogeyman to be blamed when markets are so broken like this.

>>functi+(OP)
Absolutely correct. Unfortunately and surprisingly the supposedly educated users of HN are overwhelmingly anti-capitalists somehow, your opinion and mine are decidedly in the minority recently, and that is itself fascinating to me, as I can only conclude the education system is completely broken and failing to teach both basic economics which consists of facts and is scientific and also history. I liken it to teaching creationism over evolution, preferring fantasy over reality.

>>functi+(OP)
> You want housing to be cheaper? Increase supply.

The USA (and maybe Canada) has large stocks of government land. In my country, most land is privately-owned; interfering with landowners' property rights is seriously destabilising. Property law is the basis of most law.

>>functi+(OP)
China doesn’t allow non-residents to buy property at all. You have to be working in the city you want to buy in for a few years with documentation if you don’t have hukou there.

Maybe the USA and Canada could do something similar? I find it ironic that it’s primarily Chinese investors who want us to keep our property markets open.