Berlin approves 5-year rent freeze
Its really simple. We should tax property AND rent to the point where it becomes unprofitable to hoard it for purposes of unproductive wealth extraction. Then change all rent contracts into lease-buy contracts.<p>You would accumulate a good percentage of madly overpriced rentals that no one wants then they go bankrupt one by one. You get those delicious market dynamics we [apparently] crave more than any social convention. Buildings should be hot potatoes that you don&#x27;t want to hold for to long. With this much demand it wont even affect housing prices but even if it did, who cares?<p>Gradually, (in stead of rent) people pay tax at market rates. We can keep the large scale wealth extraction and continue to force people into productivity only it would be the government doing it.<p>The same logic applies as with the teachers, taxi drivers, cleaners, garbage men, restaurant employees etc: If you don&#x27;t like it you can just leave the city. Get some of that delicious mobility going and gtfo. They can just leave for the sake of efficiency and availability. Its that simple: Just go away.<p>If you have to chose between [say] 1) a corner store OR 2) a land lord it should be obvious which one to get rid of.<p>If they are contributing to quality of life by selling food and employing people we should consider giving the store a tax cut. One could also extend the tax cut to the people working there and have cheap stores.<p>Its hilariously unproductive to have a usury scheme of greedy unproductive rent seekers extracting wealth from every transaction that is some how remotely related to real estate.<p>I just want to pay for the ice cream, pay the people involved in making the ice cream happen. Why would I pay 80% to someone who doesn&#x27;t do anything I need?