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Strategies & Market Trends : The Residential Real Estate Crash Index -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tradelite who wrote (1162)	12/11/2001 11:45:01 AM
From: Oblomov	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 306849

>>anti-ownership bias My only bias is against the idea that ownership is the best possible housing arrangement for all people. I don't think that the government should engage in housing subsidies. What makes your viewpoint eminently reasonable, while mine is biased? I have no bias against ownership per se. Don't believe me? I will likely buy a house in the next several months. But it will be on my terms, not the bank's. >>And what....exactly.... would be the basis for this different economy that you mentioned? There are only >three or four basic needs all humans have: shelter, food, water, clothing. Catering to all three or four of them >creates most of what we know as an "economy." The economy would migrate toward higher stages of production, or toward making distribution of existing goods more efficient. I do not have a deterministic or prescriptive view of economic behavior, in any case. In what sense does a 30-room house satisfy a "basic need"? The fact is that our economy is based not on the satisfaction of needs, but on the satisfaction of desires and sublimation of urges. Lucky us that we are so prosperous. There are other human needs (not so basic) when one has a full stomach, a roof (rented or otherwise) over one's head, and is not living in fear. Such as the need to be loved, which in our society sublimates as vast industries catering to our vanity. The need to communicate results in diverse media. The need for novelty created the entertainment and travel industries. Why are so many mini-mansions built, and so many 740il's bought? These types of economic activity are many steps removed from the "basic needs" for shelter and transportation.