Gentrification

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The trouble with that argument is that the housing market isn't like other markets; the modern city, after all, is the creation of the state* and not the other way round (and 'the city' in this context now extends to cover most of the countryside). Planning applications must, after all, be approved by a branch of the state.

Though I would agree that there needs to be more clarification as to what is meant by the term before it's possible to actually debate the issue.

_{*And, of course, some very famous examples of gentrification were/are literally cases of the will of the state imposing itself on (and above) the local housing market, so to speak.}

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Let's say there's a 2 bedroom house in a suburban neighborhood that is worth $100k in the year 2010.  But, last year Google opened a new office in that suburban town with 1000 high paying jobs.  Now, that house is more desirable if it were to be sold on the open market.  Would you object to someone paying $120k for that house or would you prevent someone who worked at that office from buying the house because they're an outsider?

(that's a 'no')

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No, but there is a strong case for having a certain percentage of rented housing outside of the open market. This isn't just socially right but also has the effect of putting a partial block on the worst aspects of gentrification (c.f. there are still in a lot of working class people in Islington despite it being part of the first wave - i.e. 1970s - of gentrification in London). One of the great tragedies of the contemporary American city is that the relevant authorities made such a hash of public housing.