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Comment by activepeanut | Hacker News Reader

Do you think you'll ever have kids?

I grew up with my sister, grandfather (for 10 years), dog, and two parents in a 960 square foot single-story ranch in a heavily subsidized subdivision (with an armed forces stipend both my grandfather and father qualified for). We did fine. A lot nicer of a result than the trailer home we would've otherwise lived in.

I had friends that lived in small tenements. I had friends that grew up in the projects. 4-5 people, less space. Did fine.

A huge fraction of kids who grow up in the projects do not do fine. If the projects were an automatic sentence of lifetime poverty, we'd do away with them; the fact that some people escape them blurs the issue just enough so that our brain files it away as a grey area. But it's not: the projects are bad.

One good book: _American Project_, by Sudhir Venkatesh.

>A huge fraction of kids who grow up in the projects do not do fine

I don't think anyone would debate this, however, I doubt success was ever really limited by the amount of living space they had growing up. Having lived in the "bad part" of a "rough city", square footage had no bearing on future success.

Square footage may or may not play a part in outcomes, but it's less debatable that "substandard housing" does. It's entirely possible that micro-apartments are a fine addition to the housing market. But that doesn't mean the entire idea of regulating housing is bankrupt.

I grew up in an apartment with 600 square footage. We did fine.

Now, we are family of five with a dog. We live very comfortably in 1400 square foot house. That is less than 300 square foot per person.

Square footage is overrated. It is all about maximizing your usable space. As added bonus, we spend less time in clean up and have less clutter to keep up.

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