gon [he]

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  • 39 Posts
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Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: July 22nd, 2023
  • gon [he]@lemm.eetoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•How should we approach taxing the wealthy in a practical manner?English
    2·
    1 day ago

    I’d like to preface my comment by stating that I’m not American and have never lived in the US, so my knowledge of how stuff works (IDs and whatnot) is null.

    That being said, surely there’s records for these things. I really don’t think that there needs to be a check for IDs at any point, on a personal level, because this information should be available either in the deed, and everyone’s IDs are in the electronic systems at the state and federal level. So it’s not that what you said about IDs is wrong, more so likely unnecessary, in a practical sense.

    However, I do think there are a few problematic things here.

    1. Your definition of “live in the state,” which you didn’t provide.

    Say I work in NYC, NY State, but I’m originally from Vermont. I own a home in NYC and a home in Vermont. Where do I live? Mostly in NY, but I spend my summers in Vermont. What if my husband is from Maine, so I also own a home in Maine that we go to every couple of years to meet his family? What if my son lives in South Carolina, so I own a home there to go visit him? What if I own the home, never go there, but my son does live there?

    These questions — and other questions in a similar vein that I couldn’t even think of — need to have a clear answer, if you want this sort of legislation to be applicable.

    1. Living in the state and owning several homes as an individual.

    If I live and work in Vermont, but own a whole neighborhood, what then? I’m a citizen of the state, I live in the state, I do it as an individual and not through a company. I don’t see anything in what you wrote that indicates this would be a problem, but I think it is a problem and should be encompassed by legislation of the sort you suggest.

    These two points, I believe, highlight the fact that living in a state is a really bad indicator of whether home ownership is beneficial. I think the primary indicators should be legal status — company vs individual — and maybe something like the percentage of available homes. As in, a certain percentage of available homes is allowed to be owned by companies or individuals for non-living purposes. That could work as a sort of cap on how the market can be manipulated by speculative real-estate investment.

    1. Not everyone’s a buyer.

    Not everyone wants or needs to buy a home. You want your children to be able to buy a home, great, but what if they simply don’t want to? What if they want to rent? If they move to a different state but don’t think of it as a long-term or life-long place for them, they might not want to buy. They need to be able to rent from somewhere, then. Of course, if more people can buy, more people will own, and more people will be open to renting it out. However, this is a difficult proposition, I’d imagine. Renting isn’t a bad thing, it’s about how controlled it is, how regulated it is, and who ultimately benefits from the system.

    If you’re gonna force large rental companies to sell their properties, you need to have a clear plan as to how the tenants can find other places to rent from. Again, there are a lot of people that rent not because they can’t afford to buy, but because they find that to be the best option for their particular situation. I think some kind of state or local buyback program could be good, and would allow the state to offer low-cost housing for many people, effectively flipping the rampant market speculation into a social service. Another thing could be to cap rent, I believe rent-control is a measure that already exists in some places. For example, if companies don’t want to pay the extra taxes, they would need to fulfill a certain quota of rent-controlled tenants. Something like that.

    I’m just spitballing here, but I hope my input could be of some use to you!

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