Can we talk about Abundance, Ezra Klein’s book

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

Haha you are clearly drinking the koolaid. People are tribal and generally opposed to rapid demographic or social change. Housing prices have almost nothing to do with this and ignoring human nature will not help Dems win elections in the future. The US has one of the lowest housing price to income ratios in the entire world. YIMBYs are the left wing equivalent of trick down economics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I read the Atlantic article and listened to Ezra Klein on Lex Friedman's podcast last week.

Zoning is not about "enough land". Resistance comes from established wealthier neighborhoods who show up to city council and planning meetings to fend off multifamily building in their neighborhoods, along with fending off development in historic districts. That's not really a party policy, but it does create barriers in cities which tend to have liberal governments like SF and Seattle. The people who most need a larger housing supply do not have the time and leisure to pack those meetings and are unheard. And although there was an expectation in the 70s-80s that due to energy and transportation costs hhhhhhouses would become smaller, but the opposite occurred. The average new house floor plan nearing tripled in size from 1950 to 2023, with square footage decreasing somewhat in recent years. The town adjacent to mine requires minimum dwelling floor space of 1800 sq feet plus 200 for each bedroom, so even a one bedroom house would require 2000 square feet and a 3 bedroom requires 2400. I'm not sure what the house I grew up in (built in 1957 and we were the first occupants) was but would put it at about 1200 total on two floors. It was a 1 and a half story house with 4 bedrooms and one and a half baths. Kitchen, living room, no dining room.

Single family home zoning for new development definitely costs money and adds to the cost of city services: physical infrastructure such as roads, water, electrical grid as well as distances for transportation and emergency services. It is also environmentally costly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

Haha you are clearly drinking the koolaid. People are tribal and generally opposed to rapid demographic or social change. Housing prices have almost nothing to do with this and ignoring human nature will not help Dems win elections in the future. The US has one of the lowest housing price to income ratios in the entire world. YIMBYs are the left wing equivalent of trick down economics.

I don't the the pp said the believed immigrants caused housing scarcity, jus that they were being "scapegoated."

BTW 4.6 % of US housing stock is second homes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

Haha you are clearly drinking the koolaid. People are tribal and generally opposed to rapid demographic or social change. Housing prices have almost nothing to do with this and ignoring human nature will not help Dems win elections in the future. The US has one of the lowest housing price to income ratios in the entire world. YIMBYs are the left wing equivalent of trick down economics.

That's only if you exclude housing size. US is third from bottom in price to income but that is based on the cost of a square meter. In housing size US is third from the top of a list of European countries plus Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Canada, Russia, China, India, and Hong Kong. Our average house is 2.5 times the size of a house in the UK. That makes the price to income ratio higher than the UK (as one example). A UK average size house would violate zoning standards in the town adjacent to mine (not sure what my town requires).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

Haha you are clearly drinking the koolaid. People are tribal and generally opposed to rapid demographic or social change. Housing prices have almost nothing to do with this and ignoring human nature will not help Dems win elections in the future. The US has one of the lowest housing price to income ratios in the entire world. YIMBYs are the left wing equivalent of trick down economics.

I don't the the pp said the believed immigrants caused housing scarcity, jus that they were being "scapegoated."

BTW 4.6 % of US housing stock is second homes.

The % that is second homes is also much higher in most other countries.
https://jamesjgleeson.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/image.png
Secondary homeownership is not a big contributor to housing prices in the US.

[Anonymous]

[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

This is something that upper middle class people don’t see. You’re not the ones dealing with housing scarcity. I wasn’t even going to try to discuss it here. It’s a conversation better had with other poors. Immigrants actually do increase demand for housing, but I can’t say that here without being called a racist.

Don’t call me a Trump voter for saying it. I wouldn’t vote for that clown under any circumstances. Dems need to pay attention to working class Americans again. Hillary Clinton changed the tone, and it’s been a downward spiral ever since.

MAGA voters live in places with abundant housing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

This is something that upper middle class people don’t see. You’re not the ones dealing with housing scarcity. I wasn’t even going to try to discuss it here. It’s a conversation better had with other poors. Immigrants actually do increase demand for housing, but I can’t say that here without being called a racist.

Don’t call me a Trump voter for saying it. I wouldn’t vote for that clown under any circumstances. Dems need to pay attention to working class Americans again. Hillary Clinton changed the tone, and it’s been a downward spiral ever since.

MAGA voters live in places with abundant housing.

Yes, look at the places with the lowest housing prices and highest homeownership rates. They are overwhelmingly Republican. West Virginia has the highest homeownership rate in the country and Trump won by 42 points. Other states in the top ten include Mississippi R+23, Alabama R+30.5. This is not a great indicator that some left-wing deregulatory pipe dream will ensure a democratic majority.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

This is something that upper middle class people don’t see. You’re not the ones dealing with housing scarcity. I wasn’t even going to try to discuss it here. It’s a conversation better had with other poors. Immigrants actually do increase demand for housing, but I can’t say that here without being called a racist.

Don’t call me a Trump voter for saying it. I wouldn’t vote for that clown under any circumstances. Dems need to pay attention to working class Americans again. Hillary Clinton changed the tone, and it’s been a downward spiral ever since.

MAGA voters live in places with abundant housing.

Yes, look at the places with the lowest housing prices and highest homeownership rates. They are overwhelmingly Republican. West Virginia has the highest homeownership rate in the country and Trump won by 42 points. Other states in the top ten include Mississippi R+23, Alabama R+30.5. This is not a great indicator that some left-wing deregulatory pipe dream will ensure a democratic majority.

Unfortunately, the anti-immigrant backlash has very little to do with housing prices. It has much more to do with people not wanting the demographics of their community and the country to change.

[Anonymous]

If you look at overwhelmingly blue cities like Seattle, San Francisco, LA, DC, and others, it's clear Democrats offer nothing but an F U to the middle class, the working class, and everyone under 30 without a trust fund. Democrats will subsidize the very poor with Section 8 vouchers and so on, but they will never do anything that threatens the inflated property values of the professional class that are the base of the Democratic Party. Teachers and firefighters can't raise a family in a blue city. Try getting permits to build a six story residential building in a Democratic community and the NIMBYs with the Hate Has No Home Here yard signs will be out in full force.

It's no wonder young people and the middle class have turned away from the Democratic Party. It's a party for wealthy property owners and no one else. And Democrats are so detached from the real world that they think gender pronouns and insisting Latinos be called LatinX are the pressing issues of the day. The Democratic Party is completely broken. Republicans suck too. But when it comes to kitchen table issues, Democrats are the enemy for the vast majority of Americans. Trump is the only thing that keeps Democrats even remotely viable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you look at overwhelmingly blue cities like Seattle, San Francisco, LA, DC, and others, it's clear Democrats offer nothing but an F U to the middle class, the working class, and everyone under 30 without a trust fund. Democrats will subsidize the very poor with Section 8 vouchers and so on, but they will never do anything that threatens the inflated property values of the professional class that are the base of the Democratic Party. Teachers and firefighters can't raise a family in a blue city. Try getting permits to build a six story residential building in a Democratic community and the NIMBYs with the Hate Has No Home Here yard signs will be out in full force.

It's no wonder young people and the middle class have turned away from the Democratic Party. It's a party for wealthy property owners and no one else. And Democrats are so detached from the real world that they think gender pronouns and insisting Latinos be called LatinX are the pressing issues of the day. The Democratic Party is completely broken. Republicans suck too. But when it comes to kitchen table issues, Democrats are the enemy for the vast majority of Americans. Trump is the only thing that keeps Democrats even remotely viable.

That’s not necessarily an indication that YIMBY policies will benefit democrats at the voter booth. If anything that is an indication that high housing prices and restrictive zoning might actually make the electorate more left leaning. Homeowners are more conservative than renters and the data suggest that homeownership might actually make people more conservative voters. Homeowners are significantly more likely to vote Republican than renters in 47 states. I’m very worried that this ivory tower political messaging will make homeowners more likely to vote republican and give the opposition another winning campaign message. https://fortune.com/2024/03/16/homeowners-red-renters-blue-broken-housing-market-polarized-political-culture/
Many people will be very motivated to vote if they think democrats want to destroy their neighborhood and take away local control over land use decisions. Republicans will call it woke social engineering and say that democrats want Washington to take control over your community. The messaging about democrats bringing crime and destroying single family neighborhoods will be political gold.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[twitter]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

Does the book explain why building housing requires rezoning? Why can single family home areas not exist?

I don’t think that we are out of space, at all. It’s an idealogical argument, and a bad one. So, people oppose it. This doesn’t hurt Democratic messaging. There can be abundance for all.

We could instead focus efforts elsewhere on winning arguments.

I also think the timing of the book is terrible. People don’t care about “housing abundance” when they are worried about US citizens being deported to El Salvador.

That’s not actually true. The two are related. Housing scarcity is one reason that people are scapegoating immigrants. We need to care about all of this.

This is something that upper middle class people don’t see. You’re not the ones dealing with housing scarcity. I wasn’t even going to try to discuss it here. It’s a conversation better had with other poors. Immigrants actually do increase demand for housing, but I can’t say that here without being called a racist.

Don’t call me a Trump voter for saying it. I wouldn’t vote for that clown under any circumstances. Dems need to pay attention to working class Americans again. Hillary Clinton changed the tone, and it’s been a downward spiral ever since.

MAGA voters live in places with abundant housing.

Yes, look at the places with the lowest housing prices and highest homeownership rates. They are overwhelmingly Republican. West Virginia has the highest homeownership rate in the country and Trump won by 42 points. Other states in the top ten include Mississippi R+23, Alabama R+30.5. This is not a great indicator that some left-wing deregulatory pipe dream will ensure a democratic majority.

Loom at demographics and housing trends in swing districts. That’s where we lost people, and they absolutely blame immigrants and @illegals” for everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you look at overwhelmingly blue cities like Seattle, San Francisco, LA, DC, and others, it's clear Democrats offer nothing but an F U to the middle class, the working class, and everyone under 30 without a trust fund. Democrats will subsidize the very poor with Section 8 vouchers and so on, but they will never do anything that threatens the inflated property values of the professional class that are the base of the Democratic Party. Teachers and firefighters can't raise a family in a blue city. Try getting permits to build a six story residential building in a Democratic community and the NIMBYs with the Hate Has No Home Here yard signs will be out in full force.

It's no wonder young people and the middle class have turned away from the Democratic Party. It's a party for wealthy property owners and no one else. And Democrats are so detached from the real world that they think gender pronouns and insisting Latinos be called LatinX are the pressing issues of the day. The Democratic Party is completely broken. Republicans suck too. But when it comes to kitchen table issues, Democrats are the enemy for the vast majority of Americans. Trump is the only thing that keeps Democrats even remotely viable.

This goes both ways. People want to be in those overwhelming blue cities therefore they become really expensive. It's not the Democratic party, it's the wealthy people in the democratic party who want all of these policies unless it affects them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That has always been the conservative critique: that technocratic governance, no matter how laudable the intent, almost always fails when it hits reality. Klein is skirting around that. He’s also avoiding the fact that he was one of biggest cheerleaders and proponents of the very policies he now recognizes as having failed to deliver the goods.

Finally, the politicians are part of the problem. Obamacare COULD have been single payer. There would have been a massive electoral price to pay, but there was a once in fifty year opportunity to achieve a longstanding goal and
Obama and Dems chose to try to thread the needle with incrementalism that they hoped would preserve their control of government. They got neither.

Yes - this. I like Ezra Kelvin’s podcast and the concept of his book. But I think he and others are wrong that Dems went “too far”. I think the problem is they didn’t go far enough. For example: healthcare. While Obamacare increased insurance coverage it hasn’t helped health outcomes or costs. But bc it was healthcare reform under Obama now Dems don’t want to touch that issue bc it’s “fixed”. Dems need to be strong to own up to past errors and fix them.

NIMBY-ism is another example. My town did some reason to allow more multi family housing: who is crying the loudest but the “liberals” who signed on to pledges promote diversity/equity/inclusion in all policies. They cite the fact that the new housing will result in “million dollar condos” but they ignore the fact that with no rezoning all we have gotten are $3-4 million single family houses (yes, I live in a pretty wealthy suburb). Our local elections this spring were pretty heated with a ton of finger pointing and misrepresentations and calls to “preserve the historical character of our town”. My town votes 90% Dem btw.

I don't disagree that we haven't solidly addressed some core issues as with Obamacare that you mentioned. But where we have pushed too far for the majority of the country is in social issues and over regulation. It feels like Dems are eating themselves alive with violent protests and violent rhetoric. Even AOC has seriously dialed her rhetoric back. GOP is sitting back and letting us further destroy ourselves.

I agree the social messaging and cancel culture went too far. Much like political correctness (when I first heard the term “woke” I said - oh you mean political correctness and was glared at). But IMO Social messaging does not equal being “left” or “progressive”.

That made me laugh. MAGA is canceling everyone and everything these days! Though, to be fair, they don’t cancel white men no matter how awful or harmful they may be. That’s how we got here, because they’re constantly victimized when Dems canceled men behaving badly. SMDH.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope the message is a clear and good one.

The main issue is that we don't pound the message enough or know what the message is or have too many.

Sadly, Democrats have no message beyond “get trump”. People are fatigued with this.

People are fatigued with MAGA electing and worshipping a rapist and convicted felon who tried to ruin our country in his first term and is now back at it. You MAGAs sound more ignorant by the day. You voted for hate. End of story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you look at overwhelmingly blue cities like Seattle, San Francisco, LA, DC, and others, it's clear Democrats offer nothing but an F U to the middle class, the working class, and everyone under 30 without a trust fund. Democrats will subsidize the very poor with Section 8 vouchers and so on, but they will never do anything that threatens the inflated property values of the professional class that are the base of the Democratic Party. Teachers and firefighters can't raise a family in a blue city. Try getting permits to build a six story residential building in a Democratic community and the NIMBYs with the Hate Has No Home Here yard signs will be out in full force.

It's no wonder young people and the middle class have turned away from the Democratic Party. It's a party for wealthy property owners and no one else. And Democrats are so detached from the real world that they think gender pronouns and insisting Latinos be called LatinX are the pressing issues of the day. The Democratic Party is completely broken. Republicans suck too. But when it comes to kitchen table issues, Democrats are the enemy for the vast majority of Americans. Trump is the only thing that keeps Democrats even remotely viable.

I see some of your points but voting in a facist wannabe dictator who is hell bent on destroying American is not who you turn to.