Life in a Small House
As everyone emphasizes, the cheapest form of renewable energy is really energy efficiency—just not wasting as much energy. A cousin of this point, however, is that the truly cheapest thing of all is to just do with less. So for example, American houses actually use slightly less heat energy per square meter than do European houses. But since American houses are much bigger than European houses, we use far more energy in home heating than do Europeans. The Danes are substantially more efficient than the average Europeans, so they use less energy per square meter than we do despite living in a much colder climate. But on top of that, the average Danish house is about half the size of the average American house.
Since home-related energy use is a big deal and housing is a big component of household finances, the large size of American houses is a really important aspect of the American way of life. And it is worth asking how valuable our super-sized homes really are. It’s definitely a good thing that our modern houses are much bigger than houses were circa 1900. That brought about substantial reductions in overcrowding and real benefits in human welfare. It seems to be the case, however, that we’ve crossed over into territory where further increases in house size are driven by positional arms races. People aren’t looking for bigger houses, in other words, they’re looking for houses bigger than their friends’ houses in a way that’s not producing much of any net gains in welfare.
If that’s right, then we’re really wasting a disturbing quantity of resources not only building the very large homes but also heating them. Housing spending has the long duration properties of investment goods, but it’s not really productive the way a factory or an office building is. It’s just a very big, very expensive, very durable consumer good. Which is fine, insofar as it’s really leading to satisfied consumers. But it seems that it isn’t and if we all crowded into Danish-sized houses we’d quickly adjust, feel just as good about ourselves, and then go buy more non-housing stuff (or if we actually moved to Denmark, spend the money we’re saving on housing paying very high taxes in exchange for generous public services).
131 Responses to “Life in a Small House”
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October 8th, 2009 at 3:31 pm
It’s definitely a good thing that our modern houses are much bigger than houses were circa 1990.
It’s time to play an Yglesias classic: Typo, irony, or idiocy?
October 8th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Ah –so John Podesta has finally noticed that the dollar is falling like a rock, has he?
Is this like the advice to young women re rape? Lie back and enjoy it?
October 8th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
I think you mean bigger than 1900? One did not encounter widespread reports of huge families huddled in tiny hovels in 1990.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Suburbanites pour their money into housing to make up for the paucity of the places outside their door.
I don’t need a sixth bedroom and a family room the size of an aircraft hanger, because my street isn’t a soulless waste land that crushes the spirit of any human or non-human creature that experiences it at less than 45 mph.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
I think you mean bigger than 1900? One did not encounter widespread reports of huge families huddled in tiny hovels in 1990.
Maybe not in the confines of your egghead ivory tower, but down here, in the real America, there are 10 to a hovel; a very, very small hovel.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
But on top of that, the average Danish house is about half the size of the average American house.
despite living in a much colder climate
So, Danes live in small houses and spend a lot of time waiting for the bus/tram in the freezing cold. But, they enjoy a much higher standard of living? Um…. ok…
October 8th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
So, Danes live in small houses and spend a lot of time waiting for the bus/tram in the freezing cold. But, they enjoy a much higher standard of living? Um…. ok
How exactly does a big house improve quality of living? I have 1200 sq. feet for me and my wife, and it is enough that we have one room that we never use. Or are you just so conditioned that bigger = better that you must have a 3700 sq ft. house.
And, my experience in major European cities is that you never really have to wait a long time. So you wait 3 minutes for your efficient tram to take you 20 minutes downtown. Or you can have a Seattle-esque 75 minutes in a car to pay $15 to park. Um yeah, they DO have a better quality of life
October 8th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
Yes but why does Denmark have smaller houses? You need to ask that question, too. Plus Denmark is cooler than NYC or DC not just in the cool months, but also in the hot ones. How does the lack of air conditioning factor in?
October 8th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
…but we need huge houses to contain all of our cheap plastic crap purchased from Wal-Mart!
More seriously, I think it was National Geographic who several years ago took pictures of families from all over the world standing in front of their houses with all of their possessions. The picture of the American family was just…bloody appalling.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
joe from Lowell has a good point.
I think it’s also unfair to criticize middle-class people for wanting big houses when the upper-middle-class and rich have always lived in big houses. My house is 2800 square feet–pretty big considering it only houses two people. But it was built in 1850 (no typo there–150 years ago). Thus, someone was building and living in 2800 square-foot houses in the mid 19th century. Mine is far from the biggest historic house my small town.
People like big houses. They always have.
To me the size of the house in the picture is far less of a problem than its sheer hideousness and the hideousness of its surroundings, but that is completely beside the point.
Go ahead and tell Americans that in order to save the planet they have to start living in smaller houses. Let’s see how far you get with that.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Susan,
A friend of mine told me about a video she saw, which was a parody of a sociological documentary about America.
In one scene, the family ate lunch, and everyone had their own jar of mayonnaise.
Awesome.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Chris,
How exactly does a big house improve quality of living?
That I don’t know. I much prefer a smaller place that is higher quality and close to work. Why people buy 5000sq/ft homes with the cheapest possible finishes, that’s two hours each way to work, I don’t know. Is anyone really impressed with a 5000sq/ft wall-to-wall carpeted, linoleum floored, particle board cabineted, McMansion?
I’m just trying to undermine Matt’s conjecture that the quality of life is better – it’s only better if you share Matts housing preferences (which I do).
October 8th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
Rob Mac,
In 1850, your house was occupied by a family of 9, their servants, and possibly some livestock.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Maybe not in the confines of your egghead ivory tower, but down here, in the real America, there are 10 to a hovel; a very, very small hovel.
In 1990, I lived in a small two-bedroom apartment that housed a total of six. We were poor, and it sucked. However, even in my “distressed” neighborhood, this was far from the norm. Crime and drugs were much bigger issues than overcrowding.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
jmo,
Their quality of life is better, because the places they live don’t consist of soulless waste lands that crush the spirit of any human or non-human creature that experiences them at less than 45 mph.
It is a profound libertarian error to think that the things you own are the only things that effect your quality of life.
October 8th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
Go ahead and tell Americans that in order to save the planet they have to start living in smaller houses.
The key is to never mention smaller – just mention higher quality, more features, more convenient, better more elaborate landscaping, more interesting architectural details… It’s all about nicer and more pleasant (we don’t need to mention smaller)
October 8th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Big houses are like big cars. Once they become completely impractical people will forget why they liked them in the first place.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
That’s a gigantic garage.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
jmo, what exactly is it about American residential architecture of the past 50 years that makes you think that Americans give a flying f*ck about elaborate landscaping and architectural detail? Wake up, man.
Nearly every American’s yard is landscaped exactly like the nearest gas station. And to most people architectural details are little vinyl doo-dads you buy at Home Depot. Sorry to get all Kunstler, but seriously, if one thing should be clear by now it is that Americans do not value aesthetics in their own lives.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
you could write this post substituting “asses” for “houses” and it would be a pareto improvement, plus the picture would be better too.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
In 1850, your house was occupied by a family of 9, their servants, and possibly some livestock.
Well, maybe not livestock, and probably not servants either. There aren’t enough rooms. But, yes, families were typically bigger. Still, my point stands. The rich have always lived in big houses. There’s no reason the middle class should not strive to the same.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
There’s no reason the middle class should not strive to the same.
Giant houses are a horrible idea for the middle class. Just awful.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
The heat and coolness of a house has a lot to do with construction, not just conditions, and American construction industry has forgotten how to build homes that are oriented to make the most of the sun and the prevailing seasonal winds. Most modern 3,000-square footers are glorified sheds with HVAC.
To me the size of the house in the picture is far less of a problem than its sheer hideousness and the hideousness of its surroundings, but that is completely beside the point.
The basic shell is a sad, but not tragic Federal pastiche, but the obviousness of the brick facing and the garage extension make it hideous.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
Do you want to live here:
Option A:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=40625180&page=property&brand=CB
Or here
Option B:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=242024&page=property&brand=C21
Me, I much prefer option A. But, I can see why someone would go with option B.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:11 pm
probably not servants either. There aren’t enough rooms.
There probably will have been at some point.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
I can’t believe anyone can look at that house and see anything other than its size/design as its most hideous feature. It has more rooms than occupants, I’d imagine. It has to heat and cool two floors instead of one. For shits and giggles I’ll assume the detached garage and attic are properly insulated, although I can’t tell just by looking if the whole thing is built on slab or there’s a crawl space…
October 8th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
If you want to talk about heating houses and the use of energy in Denmark, and why they use less energy, you must take in to account the fact, that 60 pct. of the houses in Denmark use district heating. And 30-40 pct. off the fuel used by district heating in Denmark is green. (biofulls ect. ect.)
October 8th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
“the places they live don’t consist of soulless waste lands that crush the spirit of any human or non-human creature that experiences them at less than 45 mph.”
I see this charge a lot. But I know a lot of people who live in the suburbs, and nary a one seems unduly burdened with a crushed spirit. They volunteer at the library, send their kids to good schools, coach their kids teams. A lot of them read books. Some of them drink too much. Others don’t. Generally, they seem a lot like the people I know who live in the city. I taught at a college for several years and knew tons of kids from the burbs. I never noticed any crushed souls there, either. It semed to me that their level of volunteerism, their grades and their behavior was basically on par with the kids who came form cites and rural areas.
As for the appalling picture of Americans and their goods, let me guess: You accept that some pictures from other places indicate people with too few goods. So there is an optimal level of goods to have. And it just so happens that if we took a picture of YOUR house and goods, that would represent the ideal.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
Go ahead and tell Americans that in order to save the planet they have to start living in smaller houses. Let’s see how far you get with that.
Which is why I quit thinking that “homo sapiens” was such a good idea.
We won’t be missed.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Example #193,475,893 of Yglesias’ entire thesis being “Everyone else in America ought to have the same desires and preferences as me. If they don’t want to live like I do they should. Never mind the fact I was raised a rich kid in Manhattan and have never left NYC/Boston/DC except to go on vacation.”
October 8th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
How exactly does a big house improve quality of living?
It gives you the satisfaction of going out and buying cheap junk you don’t need to fill up the extra, unneeded space.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Actually, a real driver of house sizes is the financing equation that the land should be about 1/5 part of the finance package for conventional mortgage financing. When the cost of the land goes up, the ’solution’ is simple- make the house bigger.
Fortunately, Matt has fixed the blip- but that doesn’t make it right. The problem in 1900 wasn’t that houses were too small, it was that some people lived ten-to-a-room in tenements. A lot of those older houses, especially those built for Catholics, are just huge.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
I can’t believe anyone can look at that house and see anything other than its size/design as its most hideous feature.
I can’t believe anyone would look at that house and see anything other than it’s bloated industrial-scale garage. Front-facing attached garages are a crime–or should be.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:22 pm
Sam, but of course that would be the ideal! All we need is for Matt Yglesias and soullite to be given the authority, and they can tell us all how big of a home to have, how many possessions to own, and how we transport ourselves between any two locations. They know what we want and what’s best for us! Why can’t people see that they are crushing their own spirits and destroying their souls?!?!?
October 8th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
Houses over 3000 sq feet tend to cost quite a bit, so I think they might be a red herring. I think we’ll also fix that problem when people learn not to buy the biggest house that they can get a liars loan for, but instead think about what fits properly with their income and priorities. But lambasting someone with kids who wants a 2500 sq ft home with 1 extra bedroom for guests/games/office isn’t going to get you very far. Its certainly true that given different options/incentives people will sacrifice some area for better housing in better areas, but European averages are pretty substantially below what I think most people would consider the point of diminishing returns on size/value.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
so for example, American houses actually use slightly less heat energy per square meter than do European houses.
This surprises me. I wonder why this is? My guess would have been that more Europeans than Americans live in moderate climates. Nowhere in Europe are the summers as miserable as they are in the Old Confederacy. And not many places in Europe are as cold in winter as the Great Lakes and Upper Mid-West.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
if present trends continue, by the year 2100, 135% of the world’s surface will be inside.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Doh! Yglesias and joe from lowell given the authority, not soullite
October 8th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
In 1990 I was 11 and was living with my family (of 4, mom and 3 kids) in a 2-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. It was, admittedly, ridiculously small, but I had all of NYC at my feet with the subway and bus system (1990 was also when I was allowed to start riding by myself regularly). Multiple parks were within walking distance, including the huge Prospect, of which I knew every square inch like suburban kids know their backyard. Since the apartment was so small, didn’t have a TV, and wasn’t air conditioned, I spent most of my time outside, I’d expect much more than the average suburban kid. Also, I spent a lot of time at the public library.
I only mention this to point out (besides Matt’s typo somewhat ironically applying perfectly to me) that having a lot of space isn’t necessary when things are reasonably accessible – especially accessible without a car, when we’re talking about kids. On the other hand, if you live in an isolated exurb, the calculus is different and more space inside and out seems very important. People talk about their “dream house” but I’d rather have a “dream neighborhood.” It all goes to how much relative time you spend in one or the other.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
thanks matt. now that you’ve decided what size house i should live in, can you come help me decorate next?
i didn’t go to harvard, so all these choices and decisions are making my tiny brain hurt.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
People buy too much house to try to get their children away from people who can’t afford to buy so much house.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Well jr, before we can move on to the decorating we’ll need to know how you got to work today. Did you drive? Tsk tsk. You should have ridden your bike.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
jmo – Quite frankly, I’d prefer option B — A is too small, but thankfully those aren’t our only choices. What I’d really like is something half the size of B, probably half as far from the central city, and in a style I prefer.
My problem is that my wife and my work puts us in the San Fernando Valley, where 90% of the housing was crap built on the cheap in the postwar era that now is crap built on the cheap that is now 50 years old. At least a cheap, crappy new house won’t have had 50 years to wear down.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
People talk about their “dream house” but I’d rather have a “dream neighborhood.” It all goes to how much relative time you spend in one or the other.
This is well said.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:31 pm
The move to bigger house size is affecting me right now. I want to by a house no bigger than 2k sq ft on over 5 acres (so I can grow apples). While there are a lot of large properties for reasonable cost in upstate NY, they have houses that are either huge or are trailers.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:35 pm
Adam,
here you go
We will call this option C.
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=63335500&page=property&brand=CB
Keep in mind – if you have a job in Boston Option A is a 15 min commute, Option B is an hour and Option C is 1.5 to 2 hours. Also, with options A you don’t need a car.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Woops.
Option A is 15 min, option B is nearly 2 hours and Option C is about an 1 hour.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
Every time Matt posts on how we should live in his idealized “post carbon cap world”, we see just how huge a hairshirt he wants us to wear.
Hot tip for the left: the majority of Americans will not be donning a hairshirt so that you can feel better about yourself.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
All of you are assuming house buyers can order something up to ideal specifications. If you’re rich you can do that, maybe, or if you’re willing to live out in the boonies.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
It would do a world of good if we could convince Americans to give up this:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=242024&page=property&brand=C21
in favor of this
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=63335500&page=property&brand=CB
October 8th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
Hot tip for the left: the majority of Americans will not be donning a hairshirt so that you can feel better about yourself.
JR, I’m decidedly on the left and I’ve already made this point. That said, no one needs to don a hair shirt or be forced into a tiny apartment in the Bronx for us to address climate change. There’s a lot that can and will be done without this sort of thing.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:44 pm
One of the problems I’ve noted when shopping for homes is that about the only price option for non-custom homes is smaller or bigger, rather than less or more thoughtfully designed.
Few people outside of Dwell or Sunset magazines seem to be buying into the not-so-big house concept of putting the money into quality, rather than quantity. Such is the joy of tract homes that about all that distinguishes the high end from the low is square feet and a granite counter top.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Every time Matt posts on how we should live in his idealized “post carbon cap world”, we see just how huge a hairshirt he wants us to wear.
James, I agree. But, if you check out my post @ 50. you’ll note the second house is 1/2 the size and 1/2 the distance to the city so that’s a huge carbon benefit. I’d hardly call option 2 a “hairshirt”.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
Few people in the trade, in any case. As Matt points out in the transport context, people adjust to what’s available, and the market isn’t set up to account for much variation.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
You know, one month of paying utility bills would pretty much encourage anyone to live in a small house.
Because housing is an expense, not an “investment.” The same reason why people shouldn’t necessarily strive to own the biggest pickup truck, the tallest bicycle, or the largest shoes. Within the middle class and upper middle class, there are an awfully large number of people who are “house poor”– they’ve strived to have a big house, and the consequence is that they can’t afford much more than that.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
Hej Mads. 60% have district heating. I didn’t realize it was that high. My wife and I live in a rented house on a farming estate. It’s 70 sq.m. (753 sq.ft.)We’ve downsized considerably from 230 sq.m. (2,476) to 135 (1,399) to our present house, which we heat with a pellet stove which is CO2 neutral. We were going nuts living in big houses with rooms we used only for storage, which meant the we had four times as much crap stored as we needed. Simplefy, simplefy.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
I’m a substitute teacher, so depending on where I’m assigned I do ride my bike. Also, I bike to and from school. In fact, about the only time I don’t use my bike is when I go on a large grocery run for my mother. Regardless, what’s your point? Cyclists are left at the whim of already existing infrastructure that make their choices for them ahead of time. If there’s no space on the road for my bike, then how do I bike there? Conversely, people make a decision to buy houses designed like that even when they could afford a smaller, more efficient house. To extrapolate just slightly, those types of houses typically exist only in suburban/exurban bedroom communities so their inhabitants likely are commuting to work with a car while living in a big open interior space designed with little regard to using the environment to help naturally heat it up or cool it down. It’s also likely the communities they do exist in lack proper road space for bicycles even within the community, so they’re probably also not biking to the movie theater, library, etc.
The shorter version, though, AB: You can tsk tsk my balls.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
jmo – You’re right, Option C is a big winner in my book.
Looks like there’s commuter rail from Reading, too. Yay!
The problem for us is that an equivalent house in SoCal, say, in South Pasadena or somesuch, would easily cost at least $800k, probably more. And that an equivalent house in the San Fernando Valley just doesn’t exist.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Based on Matthew’s previous posts, I am pretty sure that he is advocating infrastructure that does not force the default decisions of homebuyers to gravitate toward larger and larger houses.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
The problem for us is that an equivalent house in SoCal, say, in South Pasadena or somesuch, would easily cost at least $800k, probably more.
Nope a similar place is the same price in Pasadena:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=74648659&page=property&brand=CB
October 8th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
Have to say I’d skip options A, B, and C and move somewhere where I don’t have to spend over half a freaking million dollars on my house.
Seriously, I don’t know how you all on the coasts do it. Yes, I’ll grant you’ve got far more to do in your city than I do in the midwest, but you can’t actually afford to do any of it because you’ve spent all your income on housing. I can buy Option C for about 120k, and I’ll bet you someone in Boston doing my job doesn’t make anywhere near five times my income.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
Adam,
Woops I see you mentioned South Pasadena. I’m not really familar with the area
But, the Pasadena house does seem nice – finishes aren’t quite as nice though.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
Living in McMansion is like living in a McMansion, in other words it’s like you’re nobility living on an estate, powerful at the top.
My dream is an ecumenopolis of McMansions on sterilized lawns with oceans of parking. So pretty much the opposite of everything MY stands for.
That said I know we need to do other things before we can sustainably reach that point so I support mass transit, live in an apartment and never drive.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
pardon my snark. it gets the best of me sometimes.
here’s a crazy idea. instead of telling people how they ought to live, maybe we should try exposing them to the real costs of the goods and services they consume. and then let them make their own choices. that would mean we would need to severely limit the government’s ability to hand out subsidies to politically connected groups and to adopt a tax policy that’s grounded in responsible budgeting and demonstrating legitimate negative externalities.
if any of you progressive types would like to tell me how we can continue to grow government and the size and scope of government regulation without simultaneously growing the amount regulatory capture and the size and reach of all the various lobbying entities that sprout like mushrooms on k street, i’m all ears.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Every time Matt posts on how we should live in his idealized “post carbon cap world”, we see just how huge a hairshirt he wants us to wear.
Every time James Robertson whines about the sanctity of his suburban compound, we see just how much “fuck you, I got mine” is his guiding principle.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
I can buy Option C for about 120k, and I’ll bet you someone in Boston doing my job doesn’t make anywhere near five times my income.
500k = $3300 a month including property taxes
120k = 804 a month.
You’d have to make 30k more – which in my business you can in Boston vs. Columbus. Oh, and I don’t have to worry about losing my health insurance in MA.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:20 pm
Oh and cwk – include a link of a similar house for 120k where you live. I sort of belive you but I have my doubts.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but Steve Sailer is completely correct @41.
Also, I think hugo’s point at 39 is interesting, but how many parents today would be comfortable with their kids having that kind of lifestyle? (The ones who don’t have a choice manage to put up with it, but doesn’t that make the lifestyle itself a class marker?) Even though the actual crime rate is way down in the last few decades, fearmongering and paranoia about crime seems to be way up, and that seems to me to threaten the “live in the neighborhood” lifestyle that goes with high density.
Access to the neighborhood matters — if you don’t live near a gym you’re more likely to want to have some exercise machines in your home, which requires a room to put them in; if you don’t live near a park you’re more likely to want to put up some play equipment in your yard, which requires a bigger yard; etc. If you don’t actually live in a neighborhood you need all kinds of little fragments of neighborhood in your home because you can’t get to them otherwise. (My oldest brother lives in a McMansion in an exurb so low-density he’s barely in walking distance of his own mailbox, so I see this kind of stuff whenever I visit him. It’s really startling how physically isolated his lifestyle is even compared to American cities.)
And this kind of thing is horribly inefficient — if a hundred people have one exercise machine each in their houses, that’s much more total exercise machinery (and floor space devoted to same) than the same people would need if they subscribed to one gym, but a much lower variety of machines available to each user (i.e. only his own), and the same thing goes for all the other amenities of neighborhoods.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Well, if your significant other flips out one day and comes at you with a steak knife, you’ll have more time to pick up speed before having to turn a corner.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
Nope a similar place is the same price in Pasadena
Ehh, that one’s a condo, not a single-family house, and somewhat smaller. Style and details-wise, it looks pretty decent for a place built in 1964, but not really in my wheelhouse the way Option C was.
Our real problem is that our choices are limited by the fact that I work in downtown L.A. and my wife works in the West Valley, and will likely be transferred to Thousand Oaks soon. So the parts of SoCal that we actually like are either infeasible commute-wise, unaffordable, or both. What’s looking likely is that we’ll look for something near a Metrolink station, probably in Northridge, Chatsworth, or Simi Valley.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
jmo,
Ok, I take your point, 30k I could see. I still have a hard time getting over my initial emotional reflex to the idea of writing a $3300 check each month just for a house though.
I suppose I should add that my 120k Option C also comes with a 10-15 min commute to the city center instead of an hour. Health insurance is of course a big win for living in MA, though I’m lucky enough to work at a large state university which comes with a pretty great set of benefits.
Honestly, I’m a big fan of the east coast and travel there often. But the housing sticker shock still gets me every time.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:36 pm
Ten years from now, the future Mrs. Yglesias will finally pound it into the head of not-so-young-anymore Matt why married people with children do the things they do.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
Joe from Lowell @ 4
You live in Lowell and say THAT?
October 8th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
Honestly, I’m a big fan of the east coast and travel there often. But the housing sticker shock still gets me every time.
Let me tell you, when my wife was getting her Master’s degree she had a fellowship from the Eli Lilly corporation and thus spent a lot of time in Indianapolis. The housing prices in Indy were so low compared to home in L.A. as to practically make us cry. You could literally buy a lakefront mansion on 5 acres there for the price of a plain 1950s 2-bedroom tract house on a 5000-square-foot lot in a mediocre neighborhood. But after spending a few months in Indianapolis, she said that even with the difference in housing prices, the only way she’d consider taking a job there was if they offered her a salary at twice the going rate out here.
Truth be told though, we both prefer the weather in the Pacific Northwest, but the jobs just aren’t there.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:47 pm
I wrote:
but the jobs just aren’t there.
Families, too.
October 8th, 2009 at 5:59 pm
Adam,
Yep, that’s where I live. No, it’s not Boston, LA, or Chicago (I grew up in South Bend, IN, which is the last commuter rail stop east from Chicago) and I won’t try and pretend it is. But it’s not a bad mid-sized city, and there’s really quite a bit to do once you figure out where to look.
jmo,
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=361500&page=property&brand=C21
That’s in a pretty neat neighborhood with businesses and parks to walk to, and maybe 15 minutes from downtown by car.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:01 pm
#29: Which is why I quit thinking that “homo sapiens” was such a good idea.
We won’t be missed.
Richard Steven Hack has a convert!
October 8th, 2009 at 6:03 pm
I love the people who think I live in a “suburban compound”. I live in a nice, but not huge, house. I drive less than 5000 miles a year. I mostly have goods shipped to me, because I dislike driving and, other than books, I dislike shopping, too. Before you tell me about the joys of transit, I pretty much hate that too – I’d rather take the chore of driving than take the “make how many stops to go 10 miles?” choice.
About the only driving I do is to the grocery store and customer locations when I travel. I’d bet that my “carbon footprint” is dramatically lower than Matt’s; the difference is, I don’t care.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:12 pm
cwk,
Isn’t this more similar in terms of neighborhood and schools?
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=262479&page=property&brand=C21
And that’s 330k in Reading IN, which I understand is a somewhat upscale sububurb of Indianapolis.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
maybe it is your underground bunker accessible from the garage
October 8th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
cwk,
Sorry, I meant Carmel, IN.
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=283412&page=property&brand=C21
That is almost exactly the same as the place in MA and its 300k.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
When the financial bailout fails and violent chaos ensues, people will start looking for fortified hilltowns with high walls, small townhouses, and gardens on the outside within 30 minutes walking distance.
My friend in Argentina, Ferfal, just had a huge spike in sales on his book re how to survive an economic collapse –as occurred in Argentina since 2001. We were just talking on his blog about how American houses have flimsy walls that won’t stop a bullet and which invader can chop through in about 1 minute with an axe.
Plus there’s all those windows.
And suburban houses are too spread out for fortification. In most suburbans, only viable defensive strategy would be for 10 families to move into two adjacent homes and put up a palisade. Which means everyone else’s house is toast. Literally. As in arson.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
jmo,
Yeah, Carmel is an upscale suburb on the north side. Perhaps a 30-45 min commute to downtown depending on where you live. West Clay is one of those “new urbanist” developments, so it’s at least actually walkable.
But I wouldn’t pay $300k for a house in Carmel either. Not when I can pay half the price for 200 more square feet in what, to me anyway, is a better neighborhood. The neighborhood the house I linked is in is not in a bad neighborhood at all, it’s just a typical middle-class city neighborhood, not very different from the type of place I grew up. Maybe we should call it “option D” but I’m betting I certainly can’t get it for even 500k in actual Boston.
For the record, I’m not someone who bashes on people for choosing to live in the suburbs. To each his own. However, I know I don’t want to do it, and at least in the midwest I can easily afford not to.
October 8th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
Look at how people lived in ancient Greece or in Tuscany during the middle ages. Fortified villages are the only thing that works when things turn to crap.
The Romans had suburbs with villas in Great Britain circa 400 AD. Ask archaelogists what happened to them when the Legions left when the government no longer had money to pay soldiers wages.
October 8th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
cwk,
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=366750&page=property&brand=C21
369k in West Roxbury, a middle class traditionally Irish Catholic neighborhood in Boston – home to a lot of city employees – cops, firefighters, etc.
October 8th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
Don,
You’re older than I am by at least 20 years I figure. Does it really seem worse now than it did in the 1972 -1982 period? End of Vietnam, Watergate, Oil Crisis, Cold Ware,Gas Lines, Inflation, etc. etc? I know you’re probably looking back with rose colored glasses – but, if you take them off for a moment does it really seem worse now?
October 8th, 2009 at 7:09 pm
cwk,
Long story short from what I can see houses in Boston are slightly more than twice as expensive as in Indianapolis. So, it’s the difference between a 150k house and a 300k house. To make up the difference you wouldn’t need to make 4x as much – as you claimed – rather you’d need to make about 1k a month more.
October 8th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
But it’s not a bad mid-sized city,
My wife was more down on Indianapolis than I was by the end of her fellowship there, though I had only visited a few times. She didn’t think it was really a bad place, just boring.
Truth be told, I think she may have been overstating her dislike of the place based on her dislike of being all alone and living out of a hotel for long periods of time. It’s also worth noting that I think it reminded her of the small towns in Pennsylvania and New Jersey she had lived in as a child, where as an Asian she felt like an alien. No blatant racism or anything, just a general feeling of not fitting in.
The “not fitting in” thing can be relative. I remember when visiting her out there in Indy that when we shopped at Trader Joe’s and saw Jews, Indians, etc. instead of meat-and-potatoes “middle Americans”, it was like a taste of home. “Ahh, my people!” And yet now that we live in the San Fernando Valley, where there are a lot of Jews and Persians, I sometimes feel like Mr. Whitebread by comparison.
October 8th, 2009 at 7:24 pm
Matthew Yglesias,
People aren’t looking for bigger houses, in other words, they’re looking for houses bigger than their friends’ houses in a way that’s not producing much of any net gains in welfare.
It’s a gain in welfare for people who value having a bigger house than their friends. Just because you don’t value that doesn’t mean other people don’t value it. Once again, your argument here boils down to your frustration at the fact that other people don’t share your preferences.
Of course, you haven’t established how much, if any, of American housing size preferences are attributable to the kind of oneupmanship you describe rather than the desire for more living space. Danish housing preferences do not seem to be very different from American ones. Danes generally prefer single-family houses to apartments and condos, just like Americans. Richer danes generally have bigger houses than poorer Danes, just like Americans. Average housing size in Denmark has been increasing, just like in America. Danish housing is smaller than American housing because Danes can’t afford American-size houses, not because Danes don’t want American-size houses.
As reported in this study, in the Greater Copenhagen area (not just the central city, but the surrounding suburbs too), housing is so unaffordable that even a couple with two medium-range incomes cannot afford to buy a house. Just a “two- or three-room freehold flat.”
October 8th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
Once again, your argument here boils down to your frustration at the fact that other people don’t share your preferences.
Hector and Matt have so much in common.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
> Racist Sailor said:
> Ten years from now, the future Mrs. Yglesias will
> finally pound it into the head of not-so-young-anymore
> Matt why married people with children do the things they do.
Presumably you mean by this, move to the suburbs. Of course Matthew’s parents did not move to the suburbs, and raised him in the City of New York. As the parents of at least 100 million children have done since 1650 or so.
Cranky
October 8th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
It’s also worth noting that I think it reminded her of the small towns in Pennsylvania and New Jersey she had lived in as a child, where as an Asian she felt like an alien. No blatant racism or anything, just a general feeling of not fitting in.
It’s funny, I was reading that and your earlier comment and thinking how in my experience Indy wasn’t that bad, decent downtown, etc. Then I read the Asian part and I immediately thought wow, yeah, she’d feel totally out of place there, even before the next sentence. Indy pretty much defines whitebread. Peyton Manning is the absolutely perfect match for it.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
re jmo at 86: “I know you’re probably looking back with rose colored glasses – but, if you take them off for a moment does it really seem worse now?”
———–
well, the federal government –i.e,we the taxpayers — is about $11 Trillion deeper in debt.
On the other hand, Ronald Reagan is dead so that is a plus.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:07 pm
It’s a gain in welfare for people who value having a bigger house than their friends.
Mixner, you miss the point. It’s a gain in welfare only if their friends don’t get a bigger house. When everyone gets a bigger house, you no longer have a bigger one and your welfare is back where it started.
The problem is that individuals left to their own devices will escalate the arms race. Absent some other limiting factor on the arms race, it takes collective (that is, political) action to halt the arms race and instead spend the resources on less-positional goods, like health care or education or environmental cleanliness or whatnot.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:09 pm
I sleep a lot better knowing we have Obama in charge vs. Ford or Carter. Also, at 11 trillion our debt to GDP ratio is about the same as France and Germany and about 1/3 that of Japan. Somehow, I think we’ll get through it just fine.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Mixner: Once again, your argument here boils down to your frustration at the fact that other people don’t share your preferences.
jmo: Hector and Matt have so much in common.
The difference is that there are plenty of Yglesian countries that are prosperous and healthy and free, while I’m having a hard time coming up with a single such Hectorite country or even region of a country.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
I’m having a hard time coming up with a single such Hectorite country or even region of a country
Well there was Pol Pot’s Cambodia! Oh, yeh… never mind.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
The shorter version, though, AB: You can tsk tsk my balls.
Did you hear that whoosh? It was the sound of my comment going way over your head.
I did like the comeback though, misguided as it was.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
Once again, your argument here boils down to your frustration at the fact that other people don’t share your preferences.
It’s worse than that Mixner. Matt wants to use gov’t to force his preferences on everyone else. He knows what is best for us.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
AB, I actually apologize…I did not realize there was an actual jr present here. So, my bad. Thanks for enjoying it.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
The cat wants extra rooms. I try to make him settle for delicious chicken livers.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
Mixner, you miss the point. It’s a gain in welfare only if their friends don’t get a bigger house. When everyone gets a bigger house, you no longer have a bigger one and your welfare is back where it started.
No, you miss the point. It is obviously not true that “everyone gets a bigger house.” People who value bigger houses will tend to get bigger houses, increasing their welfare, and people who don’t won’t. The “arms race” is limited by the fact that people value other things besides bigger houses.
October 8th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
Rob Mac,
Sorry to get all Kunstler, but seriously, if one thing should be clear by now it is that Americans do not value aesthetics in their own lives
I was just looking back and I couldn’t for the life of me imagine why someone would chose this:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=242024&page=property&brand=C21
Over this:
http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/PropertyListing?action=detail&ComColdwellbankerDataProperty_id=63335500&page=property&brand=CB
Then I saw the hideous decor including, but not limited to, the sofa in the “man room” and I figure someone must seen the house and said “Big and hideous and 2 hours from work, I’m in love.” Ugh, I feel like Hector now – do we really need people in this world who prefer the first option? But alas… it’s a free country….
October 8th, 2009 at 10:06 pm
People who value bigger houses will tend to get bigger houses, increasing their welfare, and people who don’t won’t. The “arms race” is limited by the fact that people value other things besides bigger houses.
In both extreme cases — everybody wants a bigger house than his/her neighbor, and nobody cares that his/her house is bigger — the optimal outcome is smaller houses. I guess if you have enough people who don’t care about the relative size of their houses that they make up a significant proportion of the peers of the people who do care about the relative size of their houses, then you may be partially right. Of course, the people with the bigger houses will have won the arms race against those who aren’t competing, but they still have the rest of each other to compete against and so there’s still an arms race, among fewer participants and with some would-be racers satisfied by beating their non-racing peers.
But it’s far from clear that the fraction of people who don’t care is large enough for us to be in the Mixnerian sweet spot. And if it is, it strikes me as improbable that the proportion of housing in this country that is smaller and better-built and better-located rather than larger and less-well-built and more remotely-located is commensurate with the proportion of the population that prefers the former.
October 8th, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Re Cranky at 91: “Presumably you mean by this, move to the suburbs. Of course Matthew’s parents did not move to the suburbs, and raised him in the City of New York. ”
Yeah — and look at how that turned out.
Would you want a kid like Matthew?
October 8th, 2009 at 10:23 pm
In both extreme cases — everybody wants a bigger house than his/her neighbor, and nobody cares that his/her house is bigger — the optimal outcome is smaller houses.
Smaller than what? And how you do arrive at that conclusion? And why are “extreme cases” relevant, anyway? In the real world, people exhibit a broad range of preferences regarding housing and most other goods and services. Some people will attach a lot of value to having a house bigger than those of their friends; others, little value; and some, no value at all. In fact, some people exhibit a form of reverse snobbery and get off on consuming less than other people. It makes them feel morally superior and self-righteous.
But it’s far from clear that the fraction of people who don’t care is large enough for us to be in the Mixnerian sweet spot.
As other economists have pointed out in response to Frank, it’s far from clear that the kind of “arms race” he describes has any net negative effect on aggregate welfare at all, let alone a significant one. If you think you can make a serious case that it does, then do so. Hypothesizing is not an argument.
October 8th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
And if it is, it strikes me as improbable that the proportion of housing in this country that is smaller and better-built and better-located rather than larger and less-well-built and more remotely-located is commensurate with the proportion of the population that prefers the former.
It strikes me that the mixture of housing that actually exists, which is the product of the combined effects of the market and the political process operating over long periods of time, is likely to be a far more accurate reflection of what Americans actually prefer than your guesses about what they actually prefer.
October 8th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
As reported in this study, in the Greater Copenhagen area (not just the central city, but the surrounding suburbs too), housing is so unaffordable that even a couple with two medium-range incomes cannot afford to buy a house.
Of course it’s expensive to buy a place in Copenhagen and the inner ring suburbs… no one wants to live there or buy a small house in those places! It’s too crowded!
October 8th, 2009 at 11:18 pm
I was in a training class with a pilot from Denmark; he was showing us pictures of his rather nice new home outside of Copenhagen. I asked about prices of construction. His answer was classic, basically, with my time off as a pilot, I did all the general contracting with a lot of tradesman “off the books”. Most of his subs were doing the jobs, nights and weekends, for case. Beautiful two floors, about 2000 sqft. Avoiding the taxman, so those that disagree with supply-side economics–the Danes could give you a lesson on tax rates and black markets.
October 8th, 2009 at 11:31 pm
Avoiding the taxman, so those that disagree with supply-side economics–the Danes could give you a lesson on tax rates and black markets.
There is a limit to high how you can make taxes before it is worth it for people to avoid heavy taxation. You see that in Canada with cigarettes, where a not-insignificant amount of smuggled cigarettes are sold to avoid the heavy taxes on legal cigarettes.
However, Denmark is the most taxed country in the world. I dont think any taxation scheme proposed by even the most progressive in America would come close to the taxes they pay.
October 9th, 2009 at 12:12 am
jmo – just to clarify, when I selected Option A, it was under the assumption that I would change the decor in the barcalounger room, and I didn’t know how far outside of the city it was.
October 9th, 2009 at 12:44 am
Adam,
I had a scary thought… I was certain there isn’t anyone who would be more impressed with Option A than Option B. Then I shuddered to realize there are people like that.
October 9th, 2009 at 1:05 am
Of course it’s expensive to buy a place in Copenhagen and the inner ring suburbs… no one wants to live there or buy a small house in those places! It’s too crowded!
You’re confusing price with demand. The point is that housing in the Copenhagen area is so expensive relative to incomes that even couples with two median-level incomes can’t afford anything more than a small flat.
October 9th, 2009 at 2:07 am
Large houses have more surface area for solar panels, solar tiles -solar materials of all kinds. It is conceivable to me that at some point in the not too distant future building a big house could be more energy efficient than building a small house. There will be an equilibrium point, I suspect.
Perhaps in the future, too, these materials can made bullet proof and axe proof as well, to stop Don William’s and his Marauders from riddling and hacking your abode to pieces with a well coordinated combined arms attack.
October 9th, 2009 at 2:47 am
No, Mixner, you’re wrong.
October 9th, 2009 at 4:52 am
Bloody hell, houses for 100k, nice houses for 300k – in London you won’t get more than a crummy 1-bed flat in an undesirable area for 300k. I’m coming over!
October 9th, 2009 at 6:19 am
mixner, at 89, you’re referencing a study pyblished in 2007, which is at the end of an amazingly big housing bubble in Copenhagen (and, to a lesser extent, all Denmark). For instance, the apartment in the two-family house I live in rose from just more than 350.000 dollars to an estimated million in the period from 2000-2007 (in kroner: from 1,75 million to 5 million). Now it would be listed for perhaps 600.000. Even though there are parts of the center where your assertion is still true, there are plenty areas in greater Copenhagen – Amager, Rødovre, Glostrup – where one-family houses are affordable (ie: about 2 million kroner).
October 9th, 2009 at 8:42 am
Positional arms races if they exist mean that argues progressive taxes will be less damaging to economic efficiency than some people might think. beyond that we shouldn’t have a mortgage deduction and we should a have a price on carbon emissions.
October 9th, 2009 at 9:55 am
I love the people who think I live in a “suburban compound”. I live in a nice, but not huge, house. I drive less than 5000 miles a year. I mostly have goods shipped to me,
Thanks for proving my point. Compound = “living space set off and enclosed by a barrier”.
The J-Rob compound is one defined by physical and mental barriers that our suburban homesteader hopes will keep the rest of the world out. That’s what defines J-Rob on government — he hates it, though he likes having water, electricity and people who pick up his garbage — and climate change (not my problem). The extent of the world that J-Rob truly gives a shit about is defined in a title deed.
October 9th, 2009 at 10:24 am
I don’t hate government; I distrust large bureaucracies, public or private. I distrust companies like AT&T for the same reason I distrust the government – both are too big, and both have too many policies and procedures to actually see (or deal properly with) any specific individual.
Concentrations of power tend to go badly, regardless of whether they are public sector or private.
I actually participate in my local (village) governance, because I can impact the decision making process. At the State or Federal level, it’s virtually impossible for any individual (outside those with funds like Soros) to have any impact at all.
October 9th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Re J-Rob at 120: “I don’t hate government; I distrust large bureaucracies, public or private. I distrust companies like AT&T for the same reason I distrust the government – both are too big, and both have too many policies and procedures to actually see (or deal properly with) any specific individual.”
—————–
So why do Republicans favor policies to concentrate great power and wealth in the hands of a few hundred unaccountable billionaires and the huge corporations they own/control?
I mean, this was always the enormous deceit promoted by Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich: to focus on problems and shortcomings of Big Government while IGNORING the threat to the common citizen of Big Money.
Big Money is far more malign than a government which depends upon your vote every two years to stay in power. Big Money doesn’t give a shit what you want — you can starve for all they care. Or drown in toxic waste — or die in one of their foreign wars of conquest.
I can see the appeal of small government –if we were living in 1750. But to make it work now, you would need to reduce the US population by 280 MILLION people or so.
At which point the Commies would invade, rape your daughters, and enslave you anyway.
October 9th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Susan @9: but we need huge houses to contain all of our cheap plastic crap purchased from Wal-Mart!
I think George Carlin pointed this out some years ago, boxes for our stuff. Having just helped a couple of friends pack for a move, I must agree.
Packing a china cabinet full of china that wasn’t actually used, but only bought to fill the china cabinet, was weird enough – especially since I suspect the china cabinet was only bought because the house had a dining room, and you put a china cabinet in the dining room, dammit. Doing the same with two similar cabinets of knick-knacks, one in the family room and one in the living room, was stranger. But it was helping in the basement storage room, and pulling out the boxes that hadn’t been unpacked from the last move, that really got to me.
The really creepy version of this, though, is the after-death cleanup. I’ve done that for four sets of relatives, and it’s sobering how all the things that they accumulated, and obviously treasured, become just so many truckloads that you have to haul to Goodwill. And yes, they also had the boxes in the basement that, judging from the dates on the newspapers used for packing material, hadn’t been opened for thirty years.
October 9th, 2009 at 10:52 am
MNPundit @63: Living in McMansion is like living in a McMansion, in other words it’s like you’re nobility living on an estate, powerful at the top.
Well, maybe, provided you don’t look out the window and note the distinct lack of land and serfs. But if you can fantasize to that extent, why not just live in the one-bedroom apartment, and pretend that the rest of your McMansion is right outside your bedroom door?
October 9th, 2009 at 11:02 am
“So why do Republicans favor policies to concentrate great power and wealth in the hands of a few hundred unaccountable billionaires and the huge corporations they own/control?”
Looking over the current administration vis-a-vis the effectively nationalized car companies and the banks, I am having a really hard time seeing how the Democrats don’t promote exactly that…
October 9th, 2009 at 11:04 am
So why do Republicans favor policies to concentrate great power and wealth in the hands of a few hundred unaccountable billionaires and the huge corporations they own/control?
The republicans opposed the bailout of GM and Chrysler – those were two business who were being held accountable for building shitty inefficient cars that no one wanted to buy. Huge corporations are held accountable all the time.
See:
Lehman Brothers
WaMu
Worldcom
GM
Enron
October 9th, 2009 at 11:28 am
You’re never going to engineer the status-obsessed dick measuring contest out of human beings. And Minxer’s probably right: people do actually like these horribly ugly houses enough to justify the long commutes, taxes, and cheap quality.
But you don’t have to have a legal regime that channels the dick-measuring contest into avenues that destabilize our planet’s ability to support life. Wouldn’t we all be better off if these status-driven bubbles were still popping up over tulips or something…
October 9th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
To jmo at #86. I was in my thirties in 1972-1982. This is much, much worse. Ronald Reagan’s Republican Party was and in its current version still remains far more destructive of the nation than Richard Nixon’s was. And believe me, I never dreamed then that I would see anything worse than Nixon’s creeps.
October 9th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Re: To jmo at #86. I was in my thirties in 1972-1982. This is much, much worse.
I was just 13 in 1980, but per my own recollections it does seem that the late 1970s were a lot worse than the current era. Yes, I will fully agree that today’s GOP is way off the deep-end relative to the Republicans of that day, but a lot of other things were far worse. Inflation. The Cold War and the threat of nuclear anihilation. The energy crisis (I remember gas lines– none of those today). Riots and violence (Miami blew up in 1980; John Lennon was assasinated, and Reagan and the Pope were both shot). A general feeling of hopelessness and world’s end just around the corner. Oh yes, and disco.
October 9th, 2009 at 11:24 pm
Even though there are parts of the center where your assertion is still true, there are plenty areas in greater Copenhagen – Amager, Rødovre, Glostrup – where one-family houses are affordable (ie: about 2 million kroner).
The average price for single-family and terrace houses in Copenhagen at the end of the first quarter of this year was DKK21,174 per sq meter. So the average DKK2 million house in Copenhagen is about 94 sq meters. About 1000 square feet. By American housing standards, tiny. And that’s just the average for the Copenhagen area. In any desirable area, it’s going to be even more. Housing in Copenhagen was very expensive even before the bubble and it’s still very expensive. That’s why so few younger people, even childless couples where each partner makes a good salary, can afford to buy a house and have enough money left over for a decent standard of living (the 50% income tax rate and 25% VAT don’t help).
Copenhagen is one of the most expensive cities in the world. It might be easier to accept those prices if Copenhagen were a bigger city with world-class cultural amenities, but it just isn’t.
October 10th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
The Danes are substantially more efficient than the average Europeans, so they use less energy per square meter than we do despite living in a much colder climate.
What much colder climate? Copenhagen has similar winter temperatures to DC, warmer than a lot of the US population experiences.
October 11th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Remind me, Matt, how cold the climate of the United States is?