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Comment by tamimio | Hacker News Reader

This is how economy should work, based on physical tangible assets that owned/existed, not some imaginary value based on whatever speculation, that what ruined housing market, what inflated stocks and allowed cons to get wealthier, it’s also why a lot of companies make fake job posting or pr stunts, it’s all to inflate that imaginary market currency then use it to get a real cash, that should be illegal and is a form of Ponzi scheme fraud, if a house as-built cost is 70k, it shouldn’t be sold for 800k, and the owner shouldn’t be able to use that speculative value to get a 600k loan.

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It sounds like you're suggesting a barter economy. It works like this:

1. Bob grows oranges, and wants shoes

2. Ted hunts for meat, and wants oranges

3. Sam makes shoes, and wants meat

The only way this can work is to have a 3-way transaction. But with a money system, the money is traded without needing a 3-way transaction. It's much more efficient.

Not really, I am not saying to remove moneys entirely and use assets trading only, but the money printed or valued should be based on tangible assets, actual cost, not some made up speculation. As I mentioned above, a house that cost 100k to build and handover should never exceed that value plus profit markup, the older it gets, the cheaper it should be, just like any other assets and like how japan did it to solve the greedy banks/landlords. But obviously such thing needs to be done in an authoritarian manner as in normal democracy it will never be voted for, since most voters are owners. Other examples apply too on why things are waay over inflated for what they worth, including stocks.

There are no moneys, only money. I don’t understand your reasoning. Why should a house never become more expensive? I built a house in s remote area, 20 years later the region is much more appealing, public transport, shopping, why should I charge less than the market is willing to pay?

Because a house is a shelter, not an investment, go start a business if you want that. Japan did the right thing and made it a depreciated asset to end this ponzi scheme

>than the market willing to pay

That’s the crux, a market speculation. Well, the market is also willing to pay more for death match gambling, that doesn’t mean it should be there.

A cave is also a shelter. You gotta distinguish between some investment money buying properties in thousands, and an individual buying a house to maybe sell it for care at a later stage. If I buy a house and renovate everything, bring the standard up, why should I not be allowed to recoup the money.

Never been to Japan, they seem like smart people but they do have some issues, especially with elderly care. Maybe if they could sell their property they wouldn’t suffer loneliness so much.

Did it cost 100k to build? How much was the cement worth? Etc. now to create a house from scratch, you must first invent the universe

This is because our glorious government makes it illegal to build housing. Japan doesnt force anything, their private companies built tons of housing because there is profit to be made and its not illegal without years of reviews, insane taxes, bribes to various orgs, etc.

Your policy doesn’t even work in CA, new housing is absurdly expensive to build and the profits aren't even high.

> Japan doesnt force anything, their private companies built tons of housing because there is profit to be made and its not illegal without years of reviews, insane taxes, bribes to various orgs, etc.

Now, would you want to live in a country with conditions so absurd that "hikikomori" and micro apartments [1] are a thing?

> “A lot of younger people these days don’t have many possessions, unlike older generations – they have a few items of clothing and not that much money, so these apartments are ideal for them,” said Nakama, whose 1,500 micro-apartments have an occupancy rate of 98%.

Yeah fuck that shit. That's just exploitation, and no wonder the few young people that Japan has end up with all sort of mental health issues, no partners and a birthrate near zero. Nothing to own because there's nowhere to store something you own, not enough space to even invite another person over, much less have sex.

Cram me into such an "apartment", I'd go and search for a gun to off myself.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/20/you-could-cook...

>Now, would you want to live in a country with conditions so absurd that "hikikomori" and micro apartments [1] are a thing?

If it meant I could cut my rental or mortgage bill in half, absolutely. People have different preferences, not everyone needs or wants the same amount of space.

Why use suicidal hyperbole. It’s low class along with the language.

I don’t know if what you stated is enough evidence to prove much of anything either. Just because building housing is cheap and quick in Japan does not mean it needs to be small.

> Just because building housing is cheap and quick in Japan does not mean it needs to be small.

The thing is, cheap housing comes at a cost. Housing barely qualifying as more than "a roof over the head" is the most efficient use under capitalism... but as usual with capitalism, the second-order effects / externalities (most importantly, the collapsed birth rartes) aren't priced in. Unfortunately, for Japan's society it may already be too late to turn around.

And even more unfortunately, here in the Western countries we are headed to repeating the mistakes Japan has already shown.

Japan’s work life balance, and their housing regulations are only slightly related and I’d say almost completely unrelated

> and I’d say almost completely unrelated

To the contrary, IMHO. When you have to stay at the office until the boss leaves... you don't need a large apartment, you won't have much free time to enjoy it anyway.

The excessive amount of both fake and real work makes such horribly insane housing practices possible in the first place - if people had more free time, they'd go nuts from being cooped up.

> money printed or valued should be based on tangible assets

The US had such a system before 1914. Money was exchangeable for gold at a fixed rate. That system was destroyed in 1914 with the Federal Reserve Act, and the inevitable result was endless inflation and debasing of the currency.

The once common compliment "sound as a dollar" has vanished from the lexicon.

The USD is considered the most sound currency in the world and has been for generations; maybe it's the most sound in the history of humanity (possibly a consequence of modern international relations and communications). The great majority of international transactions are in USD. At small shops in a lot out of the way places, they accept USD; many prefer it to their local currency.

It would be a lot sounder if it wasn't inflated away by deficit spending.

"Most sound" is relative. The other countries are simply worse at inflating the money supply.

> obviously such thing needs to be done in an authoritarian manner

The value of a house is determined by the Law of Supply and Demand. Endless attempts to legislate that away have all resulted in failure.

If there are 50 houses, and 100 buyers, the buyers willing to pay more will get the houses. No amount of authoritarianism is going to change that.

end the fed?

yes, your plan would require extreme levels of oppression. it's a non-starter in anything remotely resembling a democracy. and if implemented, the outcome would still not be what you expect.

houses get more expensive due to changes in scarcity, i.e. the number of people who want to buy houses (and can afford to) in an area increasing faster than the number of people who want to sell houses there.

the main lever a government has, is to make new construction easier and cheaper -- that increases the supply. commies don't seem to like that, often because they're NIMBYs, but also because new construction tends to be in the high end segment. commies don't seem to understand that people who move into newly built high end housing do so by moving out of existing, on average slightly less high end housing, which then becomes free, and so on... all the way down to the lowest end housing. increasing supply at the highest end increases housing supply in all segments, though with increasing delay.

an option that doesn't help much with existing scarcity, but with future changes in scarcity, would be a recurring land tax (proportional to the local value of owned land). in order to be democratically feasible this would have to be introduced very gradually (over the course of 30+ years) and combined with tax decreases elsewhere.

You should probably read up on why humans initially switched to the currencies or the gold standard later.

Personally I found this one quite interesting. https://www.lynalden.com/broken-money/

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