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The numbers don’t lie: The housing crisis is not caused by a supply shortage (www.policyalternatives.ca)

submitted 3 days ago by sbv@sh.itjust.works to c/canada@lemmy.ca

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the housing crisis has been created by banking practices that have directed excessive amounts of credit into the property market, and especially residential mortgages. As a result, buyers can bid prices up to ever-higher levels, resulting in a market where people must pay more for the same type of housing. Hence financialization can be defined as an inflationary tendency in the housing market that is induced jointly by banks’ desire to expand mortgage lending and buyers’ confidence that the value of their properties will rise.

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However, the image of a bubble bursting and prices returning to a more rational “equilibrium” level does not seem to apply to the housing market. Because housing is a necessity, people are willing to pay high prices for it. Bidding wars can therefore persist even when relative supply grows, so long as credit markets enable them.

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[-] Soup@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Your first quote conveniently leaves out the last sentence which says “historical data shows otherwise.”

Now, a strawman argument is where you create a fake thing to attack. I’m explaining this to you because there are so many people who genuinely believe that demand is growing higher than supply is.

You seem to be on the side which knows that supply is not the problem, rather it’s greed. The article agrees with you at every turn, but you fight it? Did you actually read it?

[-] villasv@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Your first quote conveniently leaves out the last sentence which says “historical data shows otherwise.”

What difference does it make? It's still a straw man. Historical data will showing otherwise is what makes it a great straw man.

Now, a strawman argument is where you create a fake thing to attack.

Yes, I know but thank you. It's exactly what the "If the argument is correct, then we should expect to see..." line is doing.

You seem to be on the side which knows that supply is not the problem, rather it’s greed.

No, I'm not. I don't think there's a single cause that can easily summarize the housing affordability problem. Specially not a vague one such as "greed". Saying that greed is the problem is the kind of thing that people who confuse BlackRock with Blackstone say.

[-] Soup@lemmy.world 1 points 20 hours ago

“If the incredibly common argument that is used all the time and we did not make up(it’s not a strawman) were true then we would expect to see data which reflects that. We do not see data whoch reflects that.”

Strawman arguments need to be made up by the person attacking them. Here they are are simply talking about an existing argument and showing how it’s wrong.

[-] villasv@lemmy.ca 1 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 6 minutes ago)

The strawman is taking “supply is an issue” to mean that “dwellings per capita is going down”. Or to assume that stating the former means stating the latter. Or to assume that the former implies the latter. Whatever framing you prefer.

If you disagree this is strawman, that’s fine. Maybe there’s a bette name and we can call it something else, sorry for the confusion. The main point is that “dwellings per capita is going down“ is not representative of the view that supply is a factor in housing affordability.