Monday, December 17, 2012
Illogical to work in London to keep your own rent high
Boris Johnson: keeping out immigrants to reduce house prices 'illogical'
To be fair, he is more than clear. Immigration supports house prices. However, I think, having lived in London, that prices in London are dictated by levels of housing benefit more than anything else so this is an ingenious explanation. If you gradually reduced the housing subsidy in areas of high unemployment then prices would certainly go down. Housing benefit in London is high because it has to compete with housing benefit which is why the bill spiralled off to the sky.
Posted by stillthinking @ 02:18 PM (1590 views)
5 thoughts on “Illogical to work in London to keep your own rent high”
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Mark Wadsworth says:
“That would lead to a fall in the equity of everyone and, for the life of me, I cannot see the logic,” he told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show.
Shows how little he knows. Land values are not wealth, they are in fact negative wealth. The higher they get, the poorer we are.
quiet guy says:
I agree with Stillthinking that other factors such as interest rates and housing benefit subsidies for landlords are probably more important than immigration. Boris’ choice of words is revealing:
The London Mayor said he does not think it is “sensible” to try to keep people out of the country in order to let house prices fall … “That would lead to a fall in the equity of everyone and, for the life of me, I cannot see the logic,”
If those who might lose out on equity gains are “everyone” then renters just don’t count.
dill says:
Erm… May’s little bit of spin was a lot simpler than that. She’s saying to an electorate that still majors (just) in owner/occupation – stop whinging about immigration, it makes you rich. In other words, quit the vote for UKIP and give us a majority.
They can then execute their programme to restore an authoritarian, feudal state. Even ‘homeowners’ won’t be safe from it.
ontheotherhand says:
80%ish of first generation immigrants vote for the left wing party in the country they settle in, so in our case that was 2.5 million Labour voters who arrived over the last 10 years. This leaves 2-home MPs with mostly working and home owning voters with a dilemma. Boris however was voted in by Londoners who are majority Labour. How does he persuade both left and right to vote for him? To the left and census-revealed majority of non-white British he says, ‘I love immigrants.’ and to the Conservative voter he says, ‘I love high house prices.’
sneaker says:
So it’s nothing to do with billionaire oligarchs buying London houses as a tax dodge, then?