• toiletobserver@lemmy.world
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    4 months ago

    While i support trades, specifically those that have unions, even a journeyman plumber would have problems affording rent at $37.80 per hour. The average rent in San Francisco is $3276. Not including taxes, medical, retirement, food, Union dues, or anything else, a plumber would have to work 100 hours to cover rent. Using round numbers, that far exceeds the target of rent being 30% or less of someone’s income.

    • yeather@lemmy.ca
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      4 months ago

      That would also involve moving to less expensive areas where the pay is good and cost of living is lower. Not everyone that lives in the bay area should live in the bay area.

      • toiletobserver@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        What solution would you like to see that resolves the pay to rent gap? I’m pretty sure cities need the trades people, we’re just haggling over “how” now.

        • yeather@lemmy.ca
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          4 months ago

          Poor people cannot afford the city, if wages rise so will rents and other products in turn, leading to overregulation and strangles on the market until landlords would rather have empty homes than deal with tenants.

          • JamesTBagg@lemmy.world
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            4 months ago

            Landlords are already leaving housing empty rather than lower rents. Perhaps heavy handed regulations are needed because unfettered capitalism isn’t offering any solutions.

            • yeather@lemmy.ca
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              4 months ago

              Houses are going empty precisely because people are still submitting applications and attempting to live in them. The landlords are waiting for the perfect tennant instead of accepting the ten substandard ones rn. The market will either adjust or these landlords will lose out on revenue streams.

      • Apathy Tree@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        4 months ago

        So wait, is anyone supposed to be left there other than the few well off people who can already afford it comfortably??

        How do you expect that not to immediately collapse?

        • yeather@lemmy.ca
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          4 months ago

          That’s the point, the people doing the work move away, the market falls to a level people can live in the city, everything balances out again. The only issue would be making sure the people stay away and the issue doesn’t happen again.

          • Apathy Tree@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            4 months ago

            But that’s not what would happen because the people who can’t afford to live there are mostly the people who make society function.

            You can’t have a working city without the people at the bottom. So what you are proposing is that the city should collapse.

            Rather than, you know… just making sure people can afford to live there instead…

            • yeather@lemmy.ca
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              4 months ago

              The city won’t collapse, the rich that want to live in the bay will see to it. The whole point is there’s an overabundance of people that want to live in the same area, if the leftovers move to cheaper areas away from the bay than the housing crisis will be less impacted as a whole and prices will begin to fall.